PLAYING COLUMBINE

(USA, 2008, 94 mins)

HDCAM

World Premiere

Featuring: Jack Thompson, Tracy Fullerton, Danny Ledonne, Ian Bogost, Joel Kornek, Melissa Fuller, David Kociemba, Aaron Ruby, Tim Winter, Peter Baxter, Brian Flemming, Sam Roberts
Producer: Danny Ledonne
Editor: Danny Ledonne
Music: Cory Antiel, Josh McKnight

By reenacting one of the nation's most infamous school shootings, the video game Super Columbine Massacre RPG! (the initials standing for "role-playing game") instantly provoked more debate and discussion than any game in recent years. Media pundits pointed to it countless times as an example of a society gone off the rails. However, many failed to recognize that Super Columbine is more than a violent impulse fantasy. In fact, some who have taken the time to play it have found Super Columbine to be therapeutic and even life changing. Danny Ledonne’s film serves as an introduction to the controversial game, exploring its coverage in the press, the phenomenon of school violence and the evolution of video games as an expressive medium. It asks us to reconsider games as more than just play and asks us which subjects are fit to become interactive experiences. It introduces us to artists who are using the emergent form to explore larger societal issues. And it reexamines the film’s most controversial moment, when, after being selected as part of Slamdance’s Guerilla Gamemaker Competition, it was unceremoniously dumped by the festival director. Most of the other competitors pulled their projects in response, a clear signal of how button-pushing and polarizing this one game would become.

-- Lane Kneedler

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