Movie Gadget Friday: the brain scanner from Brainstorm
posted October 29th 2004 4:00PM
Brainstorm (directed by Douglas Turnbull, the man behind the special effects for 2001: A Space Odyssey and Close Encounters of the Third Kind, and now IMAX Supremo) is a flawed but interesting film about tech product development. We see the team go through the excitement of research and development, from clunky prototype to marketable product, and to the inevitable final stage – military funding/take over and exploitation of the application for nefarious ends.
Scientists Lillian Reynolds (Louise Fletcher at her chain smoking best) and Michael Brace (Christopher Walken holding down his mad dog thing) develop a method for recording lived experience on holographic tape which can be then played back directly inside someone else’s head. Going far beyond the modest ambitions of a computer generated virtual reality environment, the process produces the effect of total immersion in another’s thoughts, feelings and full sensory experiences. The potential and intended uses are all very commendable – for the first time, people would have the opportunity to really be able to understand each other’s points of view and ways of seeing the world. However, in keeping with the history of representational technologies, someone very quickly records the experience of having sex, and someone else works out how to play it back to themselves on permanent loop. And in a scene guaranteed to make you all feel good about your own rubbish parenting; Christopher Walken’s son manages to plug himself into a military recording of what it’s like to be horribly tortured.
Dr. Reynolds is such a dedicated workaholic that half way through the movie she manages to hook herself up to the recording device while suffering from a fatal heart-attack. Brace then becomes obsessed with experiencing the death tape for himself, on the premise that it will let him experience some kind of universal truth about what happens when you die. I don’t want to give away the ending, but one of the writers (Bruce Rubin) was responsible for the equally gushy and literally Christian finish to the otherwise great Jacobs Ladder and the entirely schmaltzy Ghost.
The director's name is actually Douglas Trumbull and also worked on Quite a few other films...Silent Running was one of them and it had the distinction of having in it Drones 1,2,and 3 - the acknowledged inspiration for R2D2 (and a possible subject for a future gadget Friday?)
He was also responsible for the Enterprise moving through V'ger sequence in Star Trek the Motion(less) picture...Beautiful, but....(snore...) Not his fault...!
Brainstorm was originally going to be shot in two formats - 35mm for the standard movie and Showscan - 60 frame per second 70 mm film for all the "brainstorm"- subjective views. Budgetary concerns, and the necessity to install Showscan projectors in theaters squelched the idea, but Showscan movies are still being made and shown around the world. It's an amazing viewing experience...
The director's name is Douglas Trumbull: http://www.imdb.com/name/nm0874320/ He's responsible for many really memorable analog effects and, if I'm not mistaken, was the inventor of the cloud tank, which you can see in action in Close Encounters.
Really do apologise for misspelling the directors name. Many thanks to you guys for pointing it out. If anyone connected with the films production is reading this, it really wasn’t meant disrespectfully. & If it’s any comfort Mr. Trumbull, you’re now in the same elite club as Mr. "Cronenburg" :
http://fraser.typepad.com/a_girl_a_gun/2004/08/existenz_cronen.html
I happened to see Brainstorm during its initial theatrical release, and the "brainstorm" sequences were indeed shown in 70mm with the regular scenes in 35mm.
They also used plain stereo sound for the regular sequences and full surround sound for the "brainstorm" shots...
The overall effect was quite dramatic -- you really felt like you were being immersed in the reality being played back by the brainstorm unit...
How, oh how, can you show such brain scanning devices without even a mention of Dr. Emmet Brown? Clearly he overcame the original design problems, even if his technical skills were somewhat insufficient to overcome a few issues. Even Mac lovers of today will still testify that design is the foremost judge of any technology.
...While some initial first releases did show the "brainstorm" sequences in a "normal" 70 mm film at 24 frame projected speed, which did give added image area and more saturated color and...just more visual impact compared to 35mm, the original idea was concieved to be in Showscan - 70mm 60 FRAMES PER SECOND which gives the brain just under 2/3 more data to actually process than standard 70 mm film shown at the standard 24 frames...
If you haven't actually seen showscan, I highly recommend it. It was actually looked into by the military for it's ability to convey more data to the brain. Explanation : divide one second into 60 parts - 24 of those parts actually convey data to the brain while 36 of those parts are actually BLACK or consisting of No data. Showscan actually conveys almost 2/3rds more stuff to process...
Doug actually spoke a while ago about going in and redoing the film and showing in showscan theaters...But that was quite a while ago...
Forgive my ignorance but is Suprimo a new IMAX film?