Thanks to what was possibly the slowest No. 2 bus in the world, I arrived at Mechanical Love only moments before it started.
This was a documentary about giving a robots a sense of presence - trying to make humanoid robots less creepy, and therapeutic animal-like companion robots for people in resting homes and the like. There were a lot of interesting points - for example, the animal robots were shaped like baby seals, because most people knew what baby seals looked like, and they were cute, but very few people had actually interacted with one; people were much more critical of cat-shaped robots, because they knew how cats were meant to react. They showed a number of older people interacting with "Paro", as the seal was called, and some of them were very favourable indeed, even though there was some disapproval from other residents and caregivers. In fact, we saw an administrative meeting where some of the caregivers expressed a concern that people would be giving love to something that could not love them back. But others basically said - if it makes them happy, more active and more sociable, where's the harm? But it would be better if the families came more instead, said one of the objectors. The advocate shrugged and agreed.
Given that people can lavish quite a bit of love on plants without these flags being raised (and I'm dubious about any claim of plants loving a person) I think that the whole "loving back" thing is a red herring. I'll admit that I felt a bit weird watching an elderly woman cuddling and crooning to this robot; but I think I felt more awkward and sad by watching a shot of another woman weeping into the shoulder of a rag doll. I think I'm with the more tolerant caretaker - if it helps, where's the harm?
There was also a large chunk of the documentary devoted to Japanese researcher Professor Ishiguro Hiroshi, who has been trying to create a convincing human-like robot - that is, one that gives you a sense that someone is there. This is both an engineering and psychological problem; and I think the engineering part has a way to go yet. When at rest, the robot (or "geminoid", as he wanted to call it, because it was a copy of a real person) looked like a corpse; but in motion, it was even more unnerving, looking at best like someone who had suffered a severe stroke. He had a trial where he got his daughter to come in and have an interview while he controlled the robot; she was initially intrigued, but it was obvious she soon moved to being severely creeped out. His wife had fewer problems with it, but it was heavily implied that they didn't see very much of each other, which Jenni and I both found a bit sad.
I think that if I were involved in this sort of research, I'd probably do video-generated characters, since it would be much easier to get a good range of movement, and people's expectations are lower for video conferencing than for a person sitting in front of them. Then I'd find out what elements are essential in this context for people to be accepted, then use this to guide my engineering efforts.
Interesting stuff from deep in the Uncanny Valley.
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I then went back to Jenni's to say hi to Lee and have a cup of tea, and then went off to the Embassy for Tom Thumb, the old technicolour extravaganza. There were a number of things that wouldn't make the cut today; the Queen of the Forest trying to get her love to kiss her by coyly trying to extract a promise not to kiss her, for example, would quite rightly be re-written to remove the "No means Yes" subtext. And the golliwogs and fat Chinese scholar toy named "Confusion" might well be altered too, though with far less justification; while the Chinese accent was pretty terrible, the toy's role was actually to be a wise adviser.
The actor playing the titular role was surprisingly acrobatic, as well as having quite a bit of dancing to do. I was momentarily thrown by the Boston Brahmin accent of his supposedly dirt-poor mother, and there seemed to be no reason for his toys to come to life other than to give him the opportunity for a couple of song-and-dance numbers; but the villains were suitably theatrically villainous, the fight scene was nicely done, the effects were really impressive for the time (and it was kind of fun to spot some of the artifacts of the techniques they had to use), and I think that children would still enjoy it, though some of the songs might drag for them.
Overall, I'm glad that I went to this.
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I noticed that The Romance of Astrea and Celadon finished half an hour into Shadow of the Holy Book, and I decided that I was more interested in the documentary, so the ticket went to Lee. I'm kinda annoyed at myself, but looking at the schedule, this was probably the hardest day to fit things into.
I'm not convinced I made the right decision. C and I went into Shadow with high hopes, but I should have been warned by the allusion to Michael Moore in the write-up. The documentary was about Turkmenistan, and Morgue's brother's favourite dictator, Saparmurat Niyazov, King of All Turkmen, and the extent to which companies attempt to curry favour with this repressive regime, either by translating the dictator's holy book, the Ruhnama, into other languages, or otherwise making it seem like there is favourable commentary in the international community about the dictator and his holy book.
I did learn a fair bit; but I found I was watching the main reporter's abrasive approach to companies and politicians, and thinking to myself that it was no wonder no-one wants to talk to this guy - saying things along the lines of, "How do you justify translating a book and thus supporting a brutal dictator" does not convey an interest in opening up a dialogue, and I can't imagine that many PR people are enthusiastic about being harangued by some Finnish documentary makers that they'd never heard of.
In some ways, it was good that the film-maker's intentions were obvious, front and centre, so that you could see where their biases lay. But I think I would have found simple white text saying something like, "After 85 phone calls over two years, Daimler-Chrysler refused to comment", rather than hearing four or five inconclusive telephone interviews. I would have also been interested in more information - they told us how big these companies are, but gave us no estimation of the worth of the work that they got in Turkmenistan as a result of stroking the dictator's ego. And they talked a lot about the human rights violations, and talked to a large number of exiles; but I don't recall seeing any figures, like "percentage of the population estimated in prison" or "political prisoners versus those who'd be considered criminals in other states", or interviews with distinguished talking heads about the situation, or information about how this guy managed to seize and hold onto power.
It felt shallow; and it was a shame, because it also felt like there was an important story to be told. I'm not a particular fan of the Michael Moore documentary style, so maybe it would work better for someone who was; but I'm left wanting the documentary that this wasn't, and hoping that film I missed was really terrible. ;)
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Finally that night, I watched I Think We're Alone Now, a documentary about two people who are obsessed with Tiffany, in a stalkerish way. One was a guy who had actually gotten a restraining order at one time against him, because he turned up wanting to give her nine white chrysanthemums and a katana as a gesture of honour - her bodyguards weren't that keen on letting the guy near her with a sharp blade. He read the news story about the incident to the camera as if it were a big joke, which was kind of scary in itself; though not as worrying as when he wore the helmet with crystals strapped to it in order to commune telepathically with Tiffany, or when he started talking about how her Playboy photo-shoot was actually her way of telling the world that she was in love with him. One of his friends (who is also a sufferer) mentioned that he has Asperger's Syndrome, and his inability to monitor people's reactions to him as he talked, and talked, and talked certainly bore that out. He certainly didn't come across as a bad man, or at all dangerous; the worst he could be accused of being was tedious, and completely unaware of other's feelings, and you very quickly felt sorry for him.
The other was an intersexed person from a broken home, brought up as female by their mother, and male by their father; they had been male through college (where they claimed they were "the most popular guy in the school"), but had chosen to be female, and conceived of their "inevitable" eventual union with Tiffany as a lesbian one. She had become obsessed after a bike accident where she was in a coma for three days; she claimed that she saw Tiffany in a vision, though she hadn't known who she was, and when the first thing her sister played for her on her walkman was... something by Tiffany, I can't remember, she asked to see a picture of the singer, and then knew that they were destined for each other. There was definitely an element of the "please watch me and be impressed!" that you get with pre-teen kids anxious to be liked; for example, getting the camera to watch her run maybe 30 meters and back, and pantingly claim that this was only maybe 37% of how fast she could go. Her friend also noted that she had a drinking problem and was struggling with depression.
The film-makers allowed the two of them to contact each other, which was nice and awkward, and then they met up in Las Vegas to see a Tiffany concert, which appeared to be in some sort of gay bar. They were both on disability payments, though the first guy seemed to manage his money better; he could afford a car, and to drive there, whereas the other person had to bus. We then saw some information about how the two of them had progressed; the woman seemed to be doing slightly better, and the man... well, he had accepted that he probably wouldn't ever marry Tiffany, but it was less a move forward than a move sideways.
The Lovely Kate was in the audience, and we had a bit of a chat afterwards; she is a teacher, and so talked a bit about her experience with children with Asperger's, how they're bang alongside rote learning (which means that they can pass things if they're appropriately guided), but how some things they find really hard. And we talked a little bit about whether what the film-makers had done was exploitative. In the end, I don't think so - there was no indication that the documentary team were disguising what they were trying to do, and the impression that I get was that the people who were the focus of the documentary would have been satisfied with how they were portrayed.
I guess it comes down to - can it be exploitative if the people affected don't think they're being exploited?
Kate, ever reliable in this regard, asked whether I saw any of myself in the people in the film. I guess an honest answer would be - the reason it was such an uncomfortable documentary was because they kept doing the things that many shy or uncertain people fear they're doing all the time, for example that they're making inappropriate jokes that make others uncomfortable, or that our enthusiasms bore other people, or that we're obviously showing off and look ridiculous, or that the people we think are our bosom buddies are, in their eyes, at best nodding acquaintances. And I guess the fear is not so much that this is true, since I know it'll be true sometimes; it's more that it'll be true, and I won't realise it and be able to stop.
I devoutly hope that it's only true sometimes. :)