There was a time when a film's release often came with its novelization: the story told in prose, to read after the cinema. MovieCineLab does the same with any film you upload: it watches it, listens to it and tells it as a book.
How it's made
The starting point is the same as for the other products: the transcribed film, the characters recognised, who says what. From there a novel takes shape, divided into chapters. Scenes become narrative, with the places, gestures and atmosphere you see on screen, and the dialogue stays the characters' own. The story follows the film from beginning to end.
Here's how one of the books from our tests begins (in Italian, the language it was written in):
Capitolo 1 · Sott'acqua
Prima ancora di aprire gli occhi, Giulia aveva visto un nero fitto, chiuso. Poi nel nero si era aperto un colore azzurrino, sfocato, come stoffa piegata. Una scritta bianca le era passata davanti, senza senso. Non aveva avuto il tempo di leggerla: l'acqua l'aveva presa.
In English: «Before she even opened her eyes, Giulia had seen a thick, closed blackness. Then a pale blue colour had opened in the black, blurred, like folded cloth. White writing had passed in front of her, meaningless. She hadn't had time to read it: the water had taken her.»
Which format and languages
You download it as DOCX, Word's format, which also opens in LibreOffice and Google Docs. It's an ordinary document: you can correct it, cut it, add pages, change names. There are five languages: Italian, English, French, Spanish and German, which can differ from the film's language.
Time and cost
For a 90-minute film it takes about two hours; about an hour and a half if you've already asked for the screenplay, because the work on the characters is done. It costs 1 minute from your pack for every 3 minutes of film, rounded up: from 5 minutes for a short film to 30 for a 90-minute film. You see the exact price on your film's Novel tab before you ask for it, together with the expected length. If the job fails, the minutes go back into your pack. You don't need to keep the page open: just come back when it's ready.
What it's for
Reading a film you loved, or discovering a story before you watch it. Giving a class a text to read about a film they'll watch together. For writers, as a first draft to start from: the plot is there, the voice is yours. And for language learners, who can read in French or German the story of a film they already know.
Good to know
The novel is written automatically. It follows the film's story and dialogue, but where the film shows something without saying it, it has to be interpreted, and the interpretation may not be the one you'd choose. That's why you get it in an editable format. You can revise it at your own pace, rework the passages you'd tell differently and get it ready for publication. As with every job, we recommend using public-domain films or videos you hold the rights to.