Cinemacity: bringing the cinema into the streets using satellite navigation

The Channel

ARTE is a European public-service cultural television channel created in 1992. Its originality lays in the fact that it targets people from different cultural backgrounds, and in particular French and German speaking audiences.
The creators of ARTE believed that a joint television channel should bring French and German citizens closer on a cultural level and promote integration throughout Europe. Creating a television channel for two audiences was a first in television’s history and is still an exception in the global TV market to this date.

The Challenge

The project around Cinemacity started in 2012. Its objective was to offer relevant content to users by taking into account the new uses of the internet and mobile devices, as well as to popularise Paris’ movie heritage. The main driver was two-fold: develop the accessibility of culture while enhancing creativity.

The Satellite Solution

Cinemacity, produced by the transmedia studio Small Bang for the Web Department of ARTE, is an application for smartphones and tablets which rely on satellite navigation to enable users to watch movie excerpts right where they were shot in Paris. So far, over 400 excerpts and 23 thematic cinewalks are available, helping users to discover the city through the lens of cinema. You can follow Amélie in Montmartre or spend Midnight in Paris with Woody Allen…
Cinemacity is also a creation lab which produces ‘fiction-walks’ on a neighbourhood scale, split into five episodes. They are original creative films produced by and for Cinemacity. Users are invited to walk from one episode to the next in order to follow the entire story.

Moreover, the application offers a unique participative and creative experience to users. They are invited to send their own “sweded” version of scenes shot in Paris, that is, remakes of the original movie excerpts with what is available at hand. 
The application is available in English, French and German.

The Result

Cinemacity is designed to be a very evolving application. Thanks to various partnerships, the Paris City Hall or the Forum des Images for instance, Cinemacity will be associated to several future events held in Paris, such as Paris Plages or the Nuit Blanche, thus being able to directly connect with on-going cultural life. In only a few weeks (the application was released at the beginning of July 2013), Cinemacity has become one of the most downloaded culture and leisure related application in appstores (IOS and Android versions are available). 

“Cinemacity is the best way to discover Paris through the cinema and to discover the cinema through the city”. Gilles Freissinier, Head of ARTE Web Department