cgi resurrections

one of the more bizarre things i saw while i was at home in june was the latest campaign ad for the prevention of prostate cancer

the ad uses bob monkhouse who died in 2003 from the disease - his face has been blended onto a body double using cgi along with recordings of his voice which have been edited together seamlessly - and there he is, talking to us from beyond the grave

although the ad is for an extremely good cause, it was quite strange watching it - bob monkhouse was and still is a household name in the uk, one of the best known faces on british tv for over four decades - for me he represented the cosy domesticity of saturday and sunday teatime quizzes and game shows and was far more viewer-friendly than the smarmy self-satisfied smugness of bruce forsyth - he was part of the furniture and i think this is why the ad makes such an impact

it also made me wonder how this technology could be used to manipulate and 're-educate' the generations which will follow us - as the technology becomes more advanced, how much of our recorded history on film and videotape will be distorted and altered by unscrupulous politicians and spin doctors in the centuries to come