The illustrated man

The science-fiction movie The illustrated man from 1969 is based on same-titled novel by Ray Bradbury from 1951. The movie contains three of the novel‘s short stories. One of them is The veldt, which forestalls the idea of generating a virtual world in a room already two, resp. four centuries before the holodeck is used in Star Trek.

Circus worker Carl‘s (Rod Steiger) body is covered all over with illustrations, looking like tattoos on first sight, but beginning to move and giving an observer a glimpse into his own future when being viewed for too long. Searching for the woman illustrating him, Carl meets tramp Willie, who gets nightmarish illusions observing the illustrated body.

In his first vision a family lives in a highly engineered house with a children‘s room transforming the children‘s phantasies into a real world. When their parents one day enter their children‘s room they find themselfs in the middle of an african wilderness surrounded by a herd of hungry lions. They ask a psychiatrist for advice, who takes a look around in the room. After the parents threaten their children locking the room, the children allure them into the room, where the parents get eaten by the lions.

Ray Bradbury is also the author of novel Fahrenheit 451, that is published in 1953 and made into a movie in 1966.

Video: The illustrated man

There is also a german version of this entry on holographie.eu

Fahrenheit 451

As announced in entry about Wild Palms, this one would like to introduce an earlier idea of futuristic TV virtual-reality using the example of dystopian science-fiction movie Fahrenheit 451 from 1966 by director François Truffaut, which is based on same-titled novel by Ray Bradbury from 1953. The title referes to the temperature at which paper catches fire. 451 degrees Fahrenheit is about 233 degrees Celsius.

Guy Montag is a fireman. But unlike an usual fireman, his job is not to fight fire, but to burn books, which are forbidden in the story. He is married to Linda, who is prosperous by consuming meds and TV shows. Montag gets to know young teacher Clarisse and falls in love with her. She is not allowed to teach any longer, because she is a passionate books reader. Montag becomes curious and starts reading books secretly.

Fahrenheit 451 (1966)

Like the snippets taken from Wild Palms, this one also shows a futuristic vision of TV virtual-reality. But with a significant difference. While in Wild Palms a holographic projection right in the living room provides the illusion of being part of the TV show, Fahrenheit 451 contents itself with a set of two-dimensional parlor wall screens, for giving the illusion of having your own family around you.

Fahrenheit 451 is brought to the cinemas three years after Emmett Leith and Yuri Upatnieks generate the first three dimensional image. So the idea of projecting a virtual image right into the air can be assumed as known. But it isn't used in Fahrenheit 451 even it would have been a good opportunity and would have made sense to do. This could of course be because of production reasons, for it could last several months or even years to produce a movie, or for it is just to expensive. Despite it is astonishing that it lasts another ten years until holography finds its way to movie. In 1976 one the first holographic images in a movie is used in Logan's Run. Even it is not used to generate a virtual-reality as it is done in Wild Palms to give the illusion of being part of another reality. It seems that Fahrenheit 451 can be read as an example of phantasms and ideas reaching conscious with a delay. Further questions result from this observation: Why does it last more than ten years until holography conquers phantasm space of movie? And when is it first used to generate a virtual-reality that can be felt, touched and experienced?