sxswf: Wired-In Watching

photo by Sandy Carson

Getting hooked up to wires as disturbing images come on a big screen can elicit flashbacks to A Clockwork Orange. My eyes weren’t propped open at Sunday's Emotional-Response Cinema...Plug In And Go Deep? panel, but there were sensors on my fingers monitoring my heart and skin conductance.

The sensors were there to measure the amount of sweat I produced watching “Unsound,” a short film about an undermedicated woman's run-in with an intruder. It’s hard to say if I could spoil the film since the data collected from the handful of wired participants changed – in real time – the score, plot, and outcome of the film, like a Choose Your Own Adventure novel where your subconscious is directing the film in a small way.

"Unsound" itself is far from groundbreaking cinema but works as a vehicle for a build-up of anticipation, painfully empathetic moments, and brief but satisfying denouement. The real success of the screening was the team of presenters, including the film's ringmaster Gawain Morrison and Drs. Ben Knapp and Miguel Perez, that offered a well-executed and thought provoking multimedia barrage.

Live demonstrations of heart-rate monitorization complete with visual data streamed to the screen, a demonstration of the link between a viewer's emotional state and audio output, and more were enough food for thought to make up for the film's lack of sustenance. One question left unanswered was how the emotional changes of the viewers manifested in the film. Was it because I was so cool and collected that there was no explosion or inexplicable viscera? If I had hyperventilated would there have been a Tarantino-esque shootout that ended the movie abruptly?

The presenters themselves claimed to have thought of only a portion of the possibilities for emotion-response technology from offering individuals music and art tailored to mood or a video game that can recognize when things aren't exciting enough for the player.

The video-game comparison seemed especially apt as both "Unsound" and the vast majority of game plots crumble under the pressure of giving participants control over the direction of the characters while also trying to maintain a writer and/or director's vision. Then again, maybe the movie was bad because I was in a bad mood. Sorry.