Grand Odyssey is a computer generated science fiction movie that will be screened at the Mitsui-Toshiba pavillion during the 2005 World Expo in Japan.

The movie takes place in outerspace but what makes it different from other computerized SciFi flicks is that movie-goers will have the opportunity to be a part of the movie.

Before entering the cinema, the audience can have their face scanned by a system called Futurecast. The facial information is subsequently rendered as computer graphics and integrated in different movie characters.

Grand Odyssey only contains two predefined faces. Apart from those, everyone who appears in the movie is a visitor to the Mitsui-Toshiba pavilion.

• Grand Odyssey

An indication of a subcultural activity that is about to go/or has gone mainstream, is when it is being portrayed in a Hollywood movie. Hacking went mainstream with 'Wargames' and even the youth culture surrounding the BMX bike turned into a global teenage lifestyle-thing after being featured in Spielberg's E.T. (and the year after, 'The BMX Bandits' starring a very young Nicole Kidman!).

Now, weblogging is about to get its own movie but in the spirit of the medium, it will not be a traditional movie production. On the contrary, it will be an open-source weblog movie made by webloggers, featuring webloggers.

TheWeblogProject is the first grassroots movie to 'promote and evangelize bloggers, the blogosphere, and their potential' and you can contribute by submitting your own video clip on the subject. The movie will be distributed free via P2P and via the Internet Archive, under a Creative Commons Attribution License.

TheWeblogProject will also feature interviews with 20 'star-bloggers' and until April 15th 2005 you have the opportunity to send in your personal list of bloggers you think they should interview.

• TheWeblogProject

SN Brussels Airlines has launched a viral campaign that effectively combines movie, web and user interaction.

The campaign, which is called Passion Film, allows you to integrate a personal text message into a movie ad and thus, to twist its plot.

In the ad, you see SN airline service personnel recieve an important phone call to one of its passengers (the call is from you). Unfortunately, the passenger has already boarded and the plane is on the runway about to take off. However, with a bit of imagination and bird-like group organization, the friendly personnel manages to get your message through to crew and passengers.

• The Message

BATMAN: NEW TIMES is a movie project by students at The Digital Animation & Visual Effect School (DAVE).

The 10 minute-long Batman movie takes place in a 3D world of computer generated Lego blocks. Every set, prop and character has been precisely modeled according to strict scale specifications and almost every location, vehicle and character has been built out of virtual Legos.

To research this project and aid in set design The DAVE School purchased over 100 pounds of Lego Blocks from dealers on E-Bay.

• Watch the movie

In 2002, the Dutch rock band Coparck released a music video for their song 'Into Routine'.

The video was created by Margit Lukacs & Persijn Broersen and slightly resembles 'Eple' by Royksopp (the transitional photo-in-a-photo-in-a-photo video). 'Into Routine' is also made of still-images, but in contrast to Eple, the images are not taken from the band member's own photo albums but from a collection of stock-photography CD's borrowed at the public library in Amsterdam.

The duo manipulated and remixed the material and - voila! A music video containing professional models and exotic places - but made with a production budget close to zero.

Broersen and Lukasc's website contains lots of documentation of everything from art-installations to commercials for Siemens Mobile.

• Into Routine

Film director Lars von Trier has invented a new set of 'dogmes' (dogmas) for an upcoming group project called 'The Advance Party', which is about to be filmed in in Scotland.

The project will be made as a trilogy and the rules of the game dictates that the three films must be directed by three different feature-film debutants who all have to use the same actors.

Furthermore, in each film, the actors must play a different role (such as: a lawyer in film A, a gardener in film B and unemployed in film C) but across the films, the roles must be tied together by the same character traits. Hence, a nose-picking character in film A, will also pick his nose in film B and C whether he is a lawyer, a gardener or unemployed.

The Advance Party is a collaboration between Sigma Films and Zentropa and the three directors are Andrea Arnold (England), Morag McKinnon (Scotland) and Mikkel Nørgaard (Denmark).

• Sigma Films • zentropa

What looks to be a disturbing viral ad for VW is a hoax.

The spot shows a suicide bomber trying to detonate a car bomb next to a crowded café. However, the terrorist only manages to blow himself up - without attracting any attention - as the VW Polo he drives absorbes the blast, thus illustrating that it is "Small but tough".

• video

Ikea has launched a new viral advertising campaign.

The campaign features a fictitious group called Elite Designers who define themselves through anti-Ikea statements such as this one:

"We are the Elite Designers. We design profound and beautiful furniture for those with wealth and taste. Which is why IKEA makes us furious livid and angry."

The campaign - which consists of slick TV-commercials and merchandise so expensive that you wont buy anything - is designed around Elite Designer's spokesperson Van den Puup who is an excentric Philippe Starck inspired caricature with an affected accent.

• www.elitedesigners.org

A Danish police officer lost his head (or foot) when he was arresting a young man outside a nightclub on a Saterday night.

The detained is lying handcuffed on the ground when the officer suddenly steps on his neck. The incident was recorded by a witness with a video enabled mobile telephone and has created headlines across Denmark.

"I have watched the the video and it doesn't look nice. However, I don't see any reason to suspend the officer" said the local police chief.

The public attorney is looking into the case.

• Watch Video

Jason Fairly won the 2004 Nokia shorts video competition, held in collaboration with the Raindance Film Festival in London.

The competition encourages filmmakers to work within the constraints of 15 seconds and the size of a mobile phone display.

Unfortunately, the films were not made available to mobile phones. Although it is technically possible to do so, it is still too expensive to download the clips on the current GPRS network (approximately £4 for the full bundle, according to The Guardian).

The idea was primarily to show the possibilities of mobile handsets but to see the films, you either have to attend a Raindance event or watch them on the web in a phone emulator.

• www.nokiashortsco.uk