Welcome to the life of Cami (Laura Marano), a recording engineer with a stable job and steady boyfriend, ready to start the next chapter of her life. When faced with the choice between long-term boyfriend, Paul (Scott Micheal Foster), high school sweetheart Jack (Jordi Webber) and famous musical extraordinaire Rex (Avan Jogia), Cami must make a choice. In this interactive romantic comedy “Choose Love,” the decision lies with the viewer.
Netflix first introduced the concept of interactive cinema with “Black Mirror: Bandersnatch” in 2018. Since then, the streaming service started adding interactive options across all genres. Though adding interactive elements doesn’t always result in a poorly-executed show, “Choose Love” proves worse than most.
Other than a few key choices towards the climax, audience selections appear largely irrelevant. With a total of six possible endings, all options revolve around the fate of Cami’s love life. Scenes suffer from insistent questioning, making it almost impossible to get immersed into the plot. Perhaps if the choices more consequentially impacted the plot, the task of choosing scenarios may seem more exciting than taxing.
The film treats the viewer as a pseudo silent participant. Cami frequently looks at the camera to both ask interactive questions but also to make small comments. This feels like a noble effort to involve the viewer in the story, however, the film chose a faulty perspective for inclusion. Had the questions come in the form of narrations rather than from Cami’s consciousness, the audience could either picture themselves as the protagonist or feet like a puppet master guiding the story. Acting as an opinionated friend creates a more passive feeling.
Additionally, the series of events feel too outlandish and the scenes themselves feel utterly uninteresting. The long chain of random happenings would fit better in a satirical piece. Since the characters never had the space to develop discernible personalities, the audience possesses no reason to care about any proceeding misfortune or triumph.
Bridging active participation and passively pleasurable movie viewing can be a tough task and “Choose Love” only exacerbated the difficulty. With choppy construction and paper thin characters, “Choose Love” does not deserve its 77-minute runtime.
1 tarot card out of 5
