Cinema audience immersion in story worlds through "ouen-jouei"

Abstract

In Japan, ouen-jouei (cheer screening) events permit novel forms of audience participation, with screened events allowing cheering, glowstick waving, and cosplaying. Fans immerse themselves in story worlds by physically performing at such ouen-jouei events. Ouen-jouei audience members become immersed in the film's story world through a process of negotiation between their physical state as a spectator and their imagined self as a story world character, as is demonstrated by ouen-jouei events associated with the 2016 Japanese animated film King of Prism. Theories associated with audience studies, media studies, and fan tourism are deployed to analyze this novel form of cinema audience immersion. It is impossible to physically integrate audience members and a film's story world, so fans' inner experiences become the primary concern.