“Choose Love”, which debuted on Aug. 31, is the first interactive romantic comedy to come to Netflix. The main character Cami, played by Laura Marano, adores her longtime boyfriend Paul, Scott Michael Foster, and she works as a recording engineer, which she finds to be a secure position. Although she can’t help but believe that something might be lacking and missing, her life is generally comfortable. In order to find answers, she consults a fortune teller that just leaves her with more questions instead.
Netflix originally introduced interactive films to their audience back in 2017 with the short film, “Puss in Book: Trapped in an Epic Tale” and have since been releasing more films creating their Interactive category. By enabling live decision-making while the audience watches movies, Netflix has raised the bar by letting viewers alter the course of the plot.
In this specific film, viewers get to choose who Cami ends up with, allowing viewers to pick up their remote and determine her fate from little decisions about whether to seek good or bad news from her fortune teller to major choices about who she should spend the rest of her life with, with just the click of a button, in which each decision can lead to one out of her 15 endings.
Unlike typical movies, in interactive films, paying attention to detail is crucial, one decision you make has the power to change the entire storyline and outcome.
“It definitely had me thinking more throughout the movie so I had to think what I was going to do next, I had more questions and was able to give myself more answers,” says junior Moon Gaytan.
Though users get to make decisions throughout the movie, they are only given approximately 20 seconds while the movie is still playing which is found as distracting and frustrating by some.
“That thing was stressful because of the amount of time they give so I was like “um I’ll just pick this one,” but I’m glad you can go back and undo your choice if you wanted to,” says senior Brooklyn Tyler.
This film has a 66% on Rotten Tomatoes and a 5.1/10 on IMDb. I would rate the movie a 7/10. It had a successful execution into the themes of love, relationships, and personal development and growth while also giving viewers to choose their plot but either giving more time for decisions or pausing the scene so they are able to process and make a decision accordingly.
