Tonight is a watershed moment in film history. At midnight EST, Sony Pictures will release Chappie as the first direct-to-GIF movie ever, making the film available exclusively as a collection of 4,500 GIFs.
Producers have confirmed that for $12.99, the complete Chappie .zip file will be available for instant download tonight at 11:59 p.m. on the film’s website, http://www.sonypictures.com/movies/chappie/.
“By forgoing a theatrical release in favor of these silent 1-to-10-second-long GIFs, we’re taking a risk we think will pay off,” said director Neill Blomkamp, who noted that all dialogue will be overlaid on the GIFs as block capital letters. “Movie-viewers’ tastes change every year—we’re confident they’re finally ready to watch a feature-length film as a folder full of GIFs.”
According to Blomkamp, the GIFs will even be ordered alphabetically by subject, allowing you to conveniently view all the clips of Chappie related to Art before skipping ahead to see the parts of Chappie related to Combat or Technology.
Here’s a preview of the film:
Awesome! We’ll definitely be at home refreshing our browser windows at 11:58 for an exciting first peek at the bold future of cinema.
