The rise of 'synthespians'

He's spent 2-1/2 years being filmed, but Andy Serkis won't get any face time on screen.

Or foot or hand or torso time, for that matter.

Yet he's being talked about as a possible Oscar nominee for his role in "The Lord of the Rings: The Two Towers," the second in the fantasy film trilogy, which opens Wednesday.

Mr. Serkis is the human actor behind the computer-generated (CG) character Gollum, a wizened Hobbit who's part manlike, part evil beast. More than just giving voice to the character, Serkis provided all its movements and facial expressions, which were later "painted over" by animators.

Gollum, who plays a large role in the story, is torn by inner conflict and must express a range of emotions as he interacts with humans.

He's "a major achievement by anyone's standards" among CG characters, says Don Shay, the publisher of Cinefex, a magazine for movie special-effects fans.

As the skills of computer animators sharpen, and the cost of animation software and hardware plummets, "Synthespians" are coming to the screen more often and in more prominent roles.

Already this year has seen Yoda of "Star Wars" fame become a high-flying, lightsaber-wielding CG character who some viewers thought was the most "alive" member of the cast of "Episode 11." And the second "Harry Potter" movie features "Dobby," the house elf, who was convincing enough that reviewers rarely singled him out for comment among the film's many special effects.

And coming movies such as "The Hulk" and "The Polar Express" may push the state of the art yet further. In "Polar Express," due out in 2004 or 2005, all the characters will be CG, though based on the work of real actors. Tom Hanks's character as a boy will combine elements of the adult Hanks morphed into how he might have looked as a child, according to published reports.

For years, Hollywood has debated the value of photo-realistic "synthespians," actors who wouldn't grow old, ask for a bigger trailer, or demand huge salaries. Last summer, the movie "Simone" took a mostly humorous look at the issue, with Al Pacino playing a producer trying to hide the fact that his beautiful new star exists only inside a computer.

While some animators are excited about the prospect of creating "synthespians" who could pass for human actors, others are asking, "What's the point?" since real actors are already available. The spectacular failure of "Final Fantasy: The Spirits Within" in 2001, whose cast was entirely made up of human-looking CG characters, seems to have cooled Hollywood's interest in large roles for synthespians for the moment.

"Everyone knows what a human being looks like. It's very, very difficult to take a computer-generated character and duplicate that," Shays says. Photos of characters from "Final Fantasy" looked "staggeringly" real, he says. But setting them in motion means their behavior, lip synch, skin texture, hair, and every other subtle element has to be just right. The human eye can detect even the slightest flaw.

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