CURIOSITIES
French Film House Seeks to Hypnotize Patrons Into Forgetting The Matrix
Pathe's 'Rewind' experiment asks whether the mind can be coaxed into seeing a beloved film for the first time, twice.
PARIS, FRANCE — The French film company Pathe is conducting an experiment to determine whether hypnosis can cause people to forget a motion picture they have already seen, so that they may enjoy it afresh, according to a report by T.K. Randall of Unexplained Mysteries, citing IGN.com.
The undertaking, known as Pathe Rewind, will employ the hypnotist Victor Kraemer. The films named for the trial are The Matrix, Se7en, La La Land and Interstellar. The report notes that the notion of selectively erased memory has long been a staple of cinema, appearing in Total Recall and Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind.
The company, for its part, offers no promises. It has stated that there is no guarantee the hypnosis will work, and that it "accepts no liability for the outcome, the effect, or any other consequences of the hypnosis sessions."
The author takes a measured view of the prospects. Success, he writes, will likely depend on the individual participants, and it seems very unlikely that hypnosis could ever serve as a reliable means of producing such selective amnesia on a large scale.
The source does not say when the sessions will take place or how many volunteers will take part. Whether any participant will emerge from the cinema believing that Keanu Reeves is a stranger remains, for the moment, unreported.