The power of the moving image.

You can’t keep a good school down. It’s been over twenty years since Cinemancy was officially declared dead, the last practitioners vanished from the earth, and yet suddenly new adepts are popping up. Why? What on earth could make a postmodern occultist reinvent a school that TV and VCRs were supposed to have killed?

Maybe it’s because there’s something in it that the modern age hasn’t killed off. Something inside its practitioners that can see things in a way their generation is supposed to be dead to.

Things are better in the movies. The good guys usually win, your life has a dramatic purpose and meaning, and no shot of the outside world is wasted. Old movies are even better; they don’t make men like Humphrey Bogart or women like Better Davis anymore, personalities who dominate their scenes and take the audiance’s love whether they want it or not. The fact that these actors had more complicated personalities in real life than their screen personas let on makes it even more special- Cary Grant was more like Cary Grant on screen than he could ever hope to be in real life.

When Plato talked about a realm of perfection that our physical world was only a reflection of, he couldn’t even know he was talking about the world of movies.

You know the truth. Movies aren’t a pale reflection of the real world. The real world is a pale reflection of movies. And you’re going to reach that world somehow, or make our world closer to it.

Generate a Minor Charge: Watch a movie on the big screen (a movie theater is preferable, but a big enough home screen will also work.)
Generate a Significant Charge: Watch an old black and white movie on the big screen, using an old-fashioned projector.
Generate a Major Charge: Find and watch on the big screen the original print of a movie important to the history of cinema (Citizen Kane, The Great Train Robbery, etc.) You must then destroy it, the hardest part for any adept.
Taboo: You may never watch (or even catch a glimpse of) a movie on tv or the small screen. Part of the paradox of modern Cinemancy (aside from fiction being realer than reality) is the fact that they love movies so much that it’s much harder to watch them.
Random Magick Domain: Cinemancy is about intensifying the world, making it more beautiful or uglier or deadlier or sexier, to get it closer to the perfect world of cinema.

Minor Spells

Focus!
-1 Minor Charge. Caster hypnotizes a crowd by flickering and sputtering like an old film on a projector. This lasts as long as the caster is willing to keep it up, though they must succeed on their Cinemancy skill each round or the target will snap out of it.

Technicolor Sequence
-1 Minor Charge. For five minutes, the world appears to be baisically black and white, but auras visible as things painted onto people in red and green (in a manner similar to the primitive technicolor sequences of old silent films.)

Cry for King Kong
-1 Minor Charge. The target feels great empathy the next time they hear a story about someone, whether in the news or in a puppet show. Has been used by some adepts to scam money (“I suddenly feel so sad for that poor war widow in need of a kidney transplant you’re telling me about! Here, take this and buy her something nice!”)

Seen It
-2 Minor Charges. Very similar to the Bibliomancer spell Book Learning. The caster can use their Cinemancy skill in place of any mundane skill displayed in the last five movies they watched.

Monster Movie
-2 Minor Charges. A cheesy monster costume- plastic fangs and a tuxedo, worn out old Swamp Creature mask- becomes utterly convincing to a designated target. They may later wonder why they ran screaming from the man with hair glued to his face in a feeble attempt at resembling the Wolf Man, but while he actually sees them, he will involuntarily suspend his disbelief.

Voice-Over
-2 Minor Charges. For one day, the caster can hear herself talking about the events from a future perspective, potentially providing warnings (“How could I have known that dame was about to get me into more trouble than she was worth?”)

Chew the Scenery
-3 Minor Charges. The target of this spell begins hamming up their personality, becoming a caricature of themselves. In addition to being embarassing, this spell has been known to make low level adepts break taboo, unable to remember themselves and check their behavior, or to make adepts cast spells in public and get whacked by the Sleepers. The effect lasts for a number of minutes equal to the caster’s role.

Significant Spells

It’s A Wonderful Life
-1 Sig Charge. Caster may enchant a role of film to show a very detailed “alternate movie”- the film of what would have happened if a specific action had been taken, rather than the one that was (what if I’d married Tess instead of Hilda? What if I’d followed up on that hunch I’d had?) For obvious reasons, this spell is usually used for actions that are not yet too late to undo.

Subtext
-1 Sig Charge. Caster watches an old movie (without charging up) and finds the movie’s themes inspire them on any given task. It won’t provide obvious answers (“Orson Welles told me the killer works for Daphne Lee!”) but it will point you in the right direction (“I never realized The Third Man was an allegory for the danger of female sexuality…”)

Production Code
-3 Sig Charges. Gives the caster temporary safety against anything the Production Code would not have been allowed to show- rape, gory mutilation, ect. They can still be shot, of course, but at least they won’t make a bloody mess.

Showdown
-5 Sig Charges. Caster taps into the power of film heroism for a number of minutes equal to their role. This allows them to flip flop dice results, provided what they’re doing is suitabley cinematic (one on one duel, impassioned speech before Congress, ect.) The trick is, if your opponant knows you’re doing it, they can also flip flop their rolls. A climax is only exciting with an impressive bad guy, after all.

You Must Become Caligari
-5 Sig Charges. For a number of days equal to your role, the poor victim of this spell finds their life has become a German Expressionist nightmare. Everything is at a weird angle, strange monsters walk the streets, the scenery is tineted odd colors, and absolutely everyone around them seems to be overacting. Should they be institutionalized during this dark period, they will become convinced their doctors are the ones who are really insane. This spell is similar to the Videomancy spell Days Of Our One Life To Live, though no Cinemancer would ever admit it.

Part the Silver Veil
-7 Sig Charges. For a number of days equal to your roll, enter into a movie or bring a character out of one. This can be used to hide from pursuers, pal around with your childhood heroes, or get help from a character who could do something better than you. You won’t be able to persuade them to act out of character, but otherwise they are generally helpful- Scarlett O’Hara won’t take a vow of poverty and celibacy, but you could get her to seduce a mob boss.

Cinemancy Major Effects
Enter permanently into a movie (the way the old guard supposedly did when they were tired of reality.) Make the world follow a pre-written script for one hour.

What You Hear
Cinema Snobs and Vidiots are never very friendly to one another- the former think the latter are brain-dead morons, the latter think the former are living in the past and spend all their time jerking off to Casablanca. For some unknown reason, as a side effect of followers of these two schools clashing, characters from movies will sometimes be seen invading TV or vice versa; Captain Picard will try to hijack the ship in Forbidden Planet, or Little Ceaser will be the next villain on Law and Order.