Cinema Film: Fans, Interactive Audiences, and Movie Producers

People enjoy going to the movie theater where they are transported to a different setting. It seems that cinema film is a main event with movie watchers purchasing tickets and buying snacks, candy, or soda. I also love cinema film, so I watch movies in the theater and buy pretzel bites whenever I can. Hall and Bracken (2011) note that people particularly enjoy cinema film because cognitive empathy creates the perception that viewers have the capability to form insightful interpretations of characters feelings during scenes. This implies that cinema viewers enjoy cinema film with being able to follow a storyline and have a proper understanding of the emotional events in the movie. Hall and Bracken (2011) claims that “cognitive empathy may also affect audience members’ responses to media narratives by contributing to their affective responses to the characters in the story” (p. 91). Therefore, cognitive empathy regarding cinema film allows spectators to feel emotionally connected to a character because aspects of this character align with cinema viewers as well.

Some fans identify with characters so well that they will dress up as the character at conferences and movie showings. These fans would be described as interactive audience members. A researcher named Jenkins defines active fans “as a specific type of audience that can be substantially distinguished from the majority of media consumers” (as cited in Shefrin, 2004, p. 273). Active movie fans are the cinema viewers who can extensively note the differences between a book and a film that was based on the book. Moreover, active fans seek to transform movie characters “with personal artistic expressions, such as clothing and creative fiction” (Shefrin, 2004, p. 273). Thus these active fans are embodying the movie character(s) to enhance the character’s significance.

There are various ways interactive audiences engage with other fans and movie producers. Some of these approaches include “close textual readings, sampling and appropriation of commercial texts and images, and the use of the Internet...as speaking back to producers and media companies” (Jenkins, 1992, p. 277-279). Today it is common for fans to use the Internet for voicing their disagreement with scene writing and scene actions that do not align with fans expectations. This technique is present with books that are turned into a series of movies. For instance, the author of the Twilight series was hounded with complaints from fans who read the books first then watched the movies inquiring about why certain scenes were portrayed differently in film.

An Interactive audience might desire to personalize characters because their embodiments make these fantasy creations realistic. Also, this audience is influenced by the movie producers since they also generated the image a interactive audience is seeking to transform. For example, active fans of Star Wars will wear face makeup and outfits that mirror popular characters. Interactive audiences would not be able to showcase their love or personalization of characters without movie producers depictions. Hence, both movie producers and interactive audiences depend on each other to accomplish their goals.