A few weeks ago my brother, odd fellow that he is, dragged me to see Journey to the Centre of the Earth starring Brendan Fraser. The draw of the film – so my big bro protested – was that it was shot using new 3D techniques, ones far removed from the clumsy red and blue glasses of Jaws-3D. I was sceptical and, as it turned out, partly for good reason: the plot of film was, shall we say, ‘thin’ and the acting was merely adequate. The actual quality of the 3D effect, however, was quite dramatic: I actually ducked when objects came toward the screen, but perhaps more importantly felt as if I were ‘there with the characters’ during conversational scenes, hovering in a space that was ‘on the screen’, yet seemed to float in front of it. Sceptic I may have been, but you can now call me impressed.

By chance, a few weeks before this, I had an opportunity to talk with Canadian playwright David Fancy, who is also a professor at Brock University. I had just seen his play Khalida and, in the course of discussing the work, he ended up telling me about some recent developments in drama theory, among the most significant of which was a move away from the ‘presence of the actor onstage’. See, ‘presence’ has become a bit of a loaded term in academics ever since Jacques Derrida used it to describe the flawed assumption that we could ever grasp things like truth or identity in their entirety. While Derrida focused specifically on language, Fancy argued that when we say “I like theatre because the actor is right there”, it makes assumptions about the links between an actor’s and a character’s identity and body, which is problematic if you’re looking to upend assumptions, say about race or gender or ability or whatever else. The ‘full presence’ of the actor is a fiction, post-whatever theorists will argue, because it assumes you can ‘get’ someone based on their appearance and their words. Rather, they – or, I suppose, we – will argue, that all you get is an endless interplay of presence and absence. You get something, but there’s always a little bit you don’t, and that little bit is not only always slipping away, it’s potentially ‘more true’ (like, for example, the unconscious).

So, as I sat there in the movie theatre with these ideas fresh in my mind, I felt very odd. After all, the actors, rather than being partial two-dimensional representations, felt much more ‘there’, almost as if they were people and not light and colour. Seeing Brendan Fraser’s face in 3D is not the same as on a two-dimensional screen. You know that feeling you get when you see a celebrity or TV personality in person and they look similar but not quite as you thought they did? It seemed just like that. But possibly more to the point, the film also starred the very traditionally attractive Anita Briem, and as I watched her, I started to feel uncomfortable. It seemed somehow wrong to be staring at this woman while noticing her attractiveness, as if I were suddenly objectifying her or, worse, invading her personal space or even… dignity. I couldn’t help but wonder: what the hell was going on?

The actors seemed ‘present’ in a much more real way to me, as if the absence produced by a two-dimensional screen was replaced by what I suppose you could call a ‘fuller presence’ in this simulation of 3D. But while I don’t actually believe that – the characters were, narratalogically speaking, about as two-dimensional as they come – the technology did a great job of making me feel quite the opposite, that these were fully fleshed out human beings with a life beyond the screen. And while the film itself was a bit of a joke, even so, the nuance of emotion on the actors’ faces or the degree of empathy I felt was sharpened and concentrated, the blasé ‘oh-look-there’s-danger-but-you-know-they’ll-make-it’ scene heightened by an increased ability to relate to what was happening on screen. Immediately, I felt almost glad this was a kids’ film. If I suddenly felt creepy looking at an attractive woman in 3D, what would my reaction have been were I watching Tarantino-esque violence depicted on screen? Or a rape scene? Probably, it would have been leaving or throwing up, and I’m as desensitised to screen violence as the next person who grew up playing DOOM or Mortal Kombat.

As the technology progresses and becomes more widespread, to what ends will 3D be put for eliciting reactions from an audience? What, if any, will be the limits of representation when the connection between the audience and what’s on screen becomes uncomfortably closer? Will certain films become like Tori Amos’ “Me and a Gun“, spare and absolutely harrowing in their capacity to provoke empathy? And what of the representation of race, gender, sexuality, ability or a host of other things? Will seeing actors of specific races, sexes etc. who seem like ‘they are there’, foreclose the potentially more ambivalent readings of identity present in 2D films? The sense that there is a ‘something else’ lurking behind what we see and acknowledge as a constructed fiction? What I guess I’m asking is this: what happens when film co-opts the supposed ‘presence’ at the core of theatre, particularly when film is the dominant artistic mode of our time?

I think these are all questions worth asking, and there are others too. Primary among them will be the effect of 3D and a sense of presence when actors are replaced by believable ‘post-Uncanny Valley‘ computer actors – what happens to how we identify with fictional characters on screen then? That, however, must wait for another post. Hit the comments if you have any thoughts.