Have you ever felt cinema is handicapped when it comes to projecting reality? Is cinema lacking something? Give a thought to it. If your answer is ‘NO’, you are wrong! What about Smell?
With the sight and sound making cinema a realistic way of representing life, there was always one thing that cinema lacked; the power of Smell. If smell can be incorporated to cinema, it will have the real 3 dimensional experience with the 3 ‘S’ operating, i.e., Sight, Sound & Smell!
Smell in Cinema
Smell is one of those sensory experiences which are strongly associated to human memories. Once smell was considered least important. In fact smell was ignored and left in the trash in an era dominated by the computers and electronics. But the sense of smell is now considered as one of the means by which visual media’s delineating effects can be mitigated.
The sense of smell is poised to break free from many of its assumed delineation. The mystery of how smell works, for instance, has defied scientific understanding for centuries. However with the award of the 2004 Nobel Prize in Physiology/Medicine to Neuroscientists Richard Axel and Linda.B.Buck, the basic code by which scents are perceived and cognitively processed seems to be on the verge being cracked (Nobel Prize Org. 2004)
Smell and Cinema is not a quite new concept. In fact attempts to incorporate smell to cinema dates back to 1916; even before sound was introduced! It was S.L.Rothafel, the owner of a film theater in
Hans Laube and Smell-O-Vision
Later on, Hans Laube was excited by the idea of smell in cinema. He invented Scent-O-Vision, a system that released scents connected to individual scents in movie theaters, and debuted it at the 1939
Scent of Mystery
For years, the technology was forgotten. But it was re-introduced in 1960’s in the mystery film aptly titled as “The Scent of Mystery”. Laube perfected his technology into a “Smell Brain”; a series of perfume bottles with scents that were released into the theater automatically as the film threaded through the projector. The process was called Smell-O-Vision.
Ads for the film read, “First they moved (1895)! Then they talked (1927)! Now they Smell (1960)! Scent track was incorporated on the film itself to trigger odors, analogue to a sound track. The release of the odors was synchronized with specific audio visual events in the film. Several of the film’s most prominent clues were set to be conveyed by the Smell Brain.
But Smell-O-Vision was not accepted by the audience for a number of reasons.Release of one scent to another was not instantaneous and had to be carefully managed to avoid odorific confusion which was not desired. Subsequent removal of the smell also had to be carried out to avoid the uneasiness created by the odor in the atmosphere. This also was not possible. Smell-O-Vision was temporarily snuffed out.
There was also another attempt to mix smell with cinema. The process was called “Aromarama” which dispersed smell through AC with Freon gas. An Italian travel feature about
All these attempts during that era can be related to the frantic efforts taken by the film makers to retain the cinema audience from Television. Certain techniques like 3D, Cinerama etc never caught on like Smell-O-Vision. But still cinema survived with spectacular viewing experience rendered to the audience. Thanks to Cinemascope and 70mm technologies.
Odorama
The idea of smell kept on exciting film makers through the years. Modern attempts at reviving Smell-O-vision were undertaken by John Waters when he released his film ‘Polyster’ in 1982. He handed over ‘Scratch and Sniff’ cards to the viewers and they were asked to smell it during specific scenes.
The ‘Scratch and Sniff’ cards had some 8-10 spots which were numbered. The audience had to scratch and sniff each spot when that particular number appears on the screen. This turned out to be quite popular and more fool proof. When the MTV re-aired the film in 1992, they handed out the “Scratch and Sniff” cards at convenient stores.
But even this idea had its draw back. Waters made old sneakers, fish, and, of course, gas to smell! This was something that made the spectators annoy! ''A critic had said, 'If you see 'John Waters' on a marquee, hold your nose,'' and Waters itself has admitted that he had made a movie “that stank!” But still the idea caught on and got some positive reviews.
Smell in Gadget Age
In the gadget age Smell-O-Vision lives on. Digiscents inc. is developing the ismell personal scent synthesizer; a device that will let smells be transmitted through the internet scent synthesizer can be compared to the desktop speakers.
In Cinema, the Collin Farell starrer “The New World” which was released in
Future Prospects
Research has shown that the human sense of smell can create stronger, more lasting impressions than sight, suggesting that smell has the potential to greatly heighten the intended effect of communication for diverse purposes. So, the idea of smell in cinema will never die. In fact it will get on to Television and of course internet too. And who knows, if we have more fool proof technologies, the entire structure of cinema might change just like sound changed the structure and story telling styles of silent movies.
Cinema is always a novelty. Cinema has not reached the saturation level yet and it will never reach there! More and more newer things will come up to make the cinema exciting as ever. Let there be more efforts to make the cinemas smell in the coming years with the increased and better understanding of the Odors and how they work and transmit. This will make cinema a real 3 Dimensional visual experience.
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