The theme and plot of this interactive film on the internet are based on the film »Plötzlich und Unerwartet - eine Déjà Revue« (1993). Just like the original 16mm film, the webfilm delivers a specific script (dramaturgy) designed to emphasize the thought that death really does have something to do with everyone's lives.

The interactive film starts with a funeral consultation session, where the viewer receives relevant information and can (in an interactively programmed dialogue) also decide his personal future (eg. burial or cremation, cryogenic freezing or organ donation).

The main setting is the closed circle of a cemetary, which become the playing field of the game. This scene is structured in such a manner, so that the viewer always returns through recurrent narrative loops to various moments in the chronology. The story continues but the viewer experiences déjà-vu situations. The viewer not only enters these déjà-vu situations - suddenly and unexpectedly - from various perspectives; - the viewer is also able to depart from these deja-vu situations in various directions. This central dramatic film element is the starting point of the nonlinear plot structure. The player can travel through time (by using the déjà-vu situations) and also through space (by using the cemetary map). The viewer is invited to solve the riddle of the story's chronology, and thereby define himself within the events.

The viewer/user/player has two choices: to watch the linear film (passively), or to actively participate in the film-based game. An animated skeleton guides one through the interactive moments. Interactivity arises from the game/film itself; but if the user remains passive, the game/film continues by itself, always choosing different paths (which nevertheless seem chronologically correct), and never actually ending. If the viewer chooses to interact with the film, some choices will affect the story flow, while others will present additional information. Some of this thematic information are helpful during the game. The player gets just one life, as people normally do. Since the human skeleton has 208-214 bones, that's the total number of bones the player can win after successfully reaching the end. As the main prize, the player can attend (even while still among the living), his own funeral rites, which he designed throughout the game with his own choices.

"Sudden and Unexpected" is an interactive participatory film which approaches the overall serious subject of death and dying in a humorous and droll, but also abstract, cathartic and thoughtful manner.

{translation: Wayne Yung}