A work in constant progress (and occasional regress).
Release Date:
June 15, 2010
Original Title:
{Houdini} Séance
Ratings / Certifications:
N/A
Runtime: 16
The séance is the prototype of modern multi-media. I approach the séance as a medium, or a structural form of media manipulation, somewhere between an art and a belief-system, a cutting-edge demonstration of new technologies mixed with psychic projection. It originated as a novel form of interactive performance, or staged improvisation with a live audience. It ingeniously employs technological innovations in a theatrical environment that incorporates newly developed and experimental devices, such as the phonograph, slide projection and cinema, as well as hidden speakers, magnifying lenses, and mobile lighting., often creating, through special effects, the experience of disembodied voices and floating human figures approximating visitations of the dead and ghostly presences. -BE
Most data and links to images for the Movies section come from TheMovieDB (TMDB).
Additional data for Film Titles come from The Open Movie Database (OMDb).
At least one plug-in comes from IMDb.
Data are -- hey, it's a plural -- subject to the limitations of their sources. (For example, TMDB search results currently max out at 20.) I am limiting myself to free data sources for now. (No, a "free trial" is not free.)
While much of the above data are retrieved directly from outside APIs and other such sources, data from American Film Institute (AFI) and British Film Institute (BFI) were manually entered the old fashioned way into a MySQL database. Re BFI I took the following liberties:
Regarding profile removals and data corrections:
Filtering is applied here to film projects flagged as "adult" by TheMovieDB. Pending "popular demand" I am contemplating a login and profile system with preferences (such as whether to allow adult images to appear) and permissions (such as data entry).
Whereas the overall purpose of this website is to serve as a personal demo/portfolio/workshop of web and data skills, this Movies section is not meant to compete with or substitute for far more definitive movie websites.
Whether or not he still clings to an award which he won in 1986 as a film critic for his college's newspaper, Jeffrey Hartmann is not responsible for the texts of overviews and biographies supplied by external data sources.