The phenomenon of massively multiplayer online role-playing games seems like the perfect documentary subject. Collectively, MMORPGs have upwards of 50 million worldwide users and counting. The dilemma in selling a movie like Second Skin is not in finding an audience, the challenge is finding compelling images to put on screen. People don’t normally line up around to block to watch people sit in front of a computer for 12 hours a day.

Based on the audience reaction at Friday night’s premiere, the solution to the visual problem provided by director Juan Carlos Pineiro worked swimmingly. A rock concert atmosphere complete with a standing ovation followed the screening. A deft combination of dramatically animated statistical graphics combined with artfully incorporated machinima give the film a visual punch to match its compelling subject matter.

The film follows the lives of a handful of people immersed in online role-playing games. The recovering addict and his conflicted support councilor, the couple that falls in love in-game, and four best friends whose real lives begin to encroach on their hours of virtual ass-kicking as a top World of WarCraft guild. In between check-ups on the various story lines, interviews with experts in the field, statistical break-downs of the industry, and a visit to a Chinese virtual gold farm round out the film.

Because of how much ground is covered, Second Skin doesn’t have much time to spend living with it’s subjects. Surprisingly, plenty of human drama is packed into the relatively little screen time given to each story. While we’re unable to fully immerse ourselves in the tensions that arise when a relationship formed in EverQuest II hits some snags after one party moves across the country for the other, the snide comments and uneasy laughs in a double interview speak volumes.

Second Skin is not a subtle film. Piniero has a lot of ground to cover, and he dispenses with nuanced formations of character in order to zero in on the burning question the film presents: are these games good or bad? Or, do these games enrich the lives of players, or destroy them? The true strength of the film is that Piniero has resisted answering that question. Every laughable evidence of denial that surfaces in an interview is balanced with a heartfelt portrayal of how these games, intentionally build around a spirit of collaboration and camaraderie, really do bring people together.

The most poignant example comes late in the film, when the founder of a gamer-addiction support service tearfully recounts the story of her son taking his own life while logged in to EverQuest. Just when we think the film has read its verdict, that these games destroy life, Piniero counters with a brief but stunning segment about gamers with severe physical disabilities gaining a new lease on life in virtual worlds. In the form of text scrolled across the screen, one young man very poetically shares that the worst part of his disability is his inability to talk. While beautiful machinima montages of a trip to a beach in Second Life play, he explains how the game releases him from the strains of physical reality, giving him an even footing with which to enter another social realm.

While Second Skin could benefit from a few small tweaks, overall it is a deeply engaging and effective film, sure to entertain gamers and non-gamers alike.

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