"Choose Your Own Adventure" style books from my generation's childhood have been reinvented for the silver screen. Well, not quite; rather, reinvented for the computer screen. A New York Times article discusses The Onyx Project, a film released today on DVD that brings the philosophy of Borges to life in the movies.
The Onyx Project is "meant to be an experiment in nonlinear storytelling for the digital age." Viewers navigate their way through 400 scenes, each no longer than two minutes long. Ultimately, NAV (non-linear arrayed video), the software technology that makes the navigation possible, provides each viewer with millions of different plotline pathways. The filmakers intend that no one will watch the same movie, "yet its basic facts, characters, and message will permeate the experience." You can learn more about NAV through the movie's website, linked above.
What I find most interesting about this project is its implications for the future: "(The creators') hope is that future projects built around the software will include documentaries or educational videos with thousands of links that viewers can click to take them wherever their interests may lie." I don't think this is what they are implying, but I can envision software encoded movies could eventually include, within the actual footage, hyperlinks to anything that you want to explore further. For example, if a scene in a war movie included a Stealth flying across the sky, maybe viewers could click on the object and jump offsite to something that tells about the history of the Stealth. A movie may become something that can diffract in a million different directions, whether it be scene selection or information content.
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