Crowd, Space and the Movie Theater Lure. Notes on Contemporary Off/Online Moviegoing

Abstract

The article explores crowdsourced practices connected to the spaces of filmic consumption. In order to contextualize them, the concept of crowd is presented under a critic-historical light, with the aim of underscoring the continuity/discontinuity elements between modern and contemporary formulations. Following Benjamin, Kracauer and Hansen’s interpretation of their seminal works, moviegoing is therefore sketched as a collective process that benefits from new technologies and the collaborative possibilities they open up. After a reconstruction of the concept of crowdsourcing, a focus on website Gathr (http://gathr.us/) illustrates the peculiar cinematic experience enabled by such online service, highlighting the chance of coupling traditional processes/spaces of consumption with contemporary ones, and giving thus birth to a virtuous integration.