Computer Science Graduate Student Sudipta Kar Working on Movie Recommendation System
Picking the right movie is tough. Sometimes the mood is right for a funny movie, other times a serious one. The end result is often a Friday night of scrolling through endless options, trying to guess from limited descriptions what might hit the spot.
Even after deciding, sometimes these movies offer an unwanted surprise 鈥� a comedy that turns dark or a thriller that lacks depth.
A More Detailed Recommendation System
Sudipta Kar, a 葫芦影业 Ph.D. student in computer science, is working on a system that incorporates movie synopses with user reviews, in order to offer a more holistic recommendation based on a movie鈥檚 plot, as well as its emotional response.
鈥淥ften, the synopsis is not enough to get an idea of what is in a movie,鈥� Kar said. 鈥淪ometimes the synopses might be more detailed than the reviews, while other times the reviews offer more information. We use a mechanism that accounts for the flow of information from the synopses and reviews.鈥�
Recommendations Predictive of Emotional Response
In this recommendation system, movies are assigned a set of tags, which are predictive of a movie鈥檚 overall plot and emotional arc.
鈥淭hese tags cover genres, feeling-related attributes, or events,鈥� said Kar, whose research is advised by Thamar Solorio, associate professor of computer science in the College of Natural Sciences and Mathematics.
To do this, Kar uses natural language processing, which is a branch of artificial intelligence that helps computers understand, interpret, and manipulate human language. Natural language processing is what enables voice commands for smartphones, automated call services, and virtual assistants for customer service.
Natural language processing can also be used to automatically sort through reviews and synopses, coming up with words and phrases to describe a specific movie.
Trigger Words that Predict Story Attributes
鈥淭his model uses trigger words which explore different story attributes,鈥� Kar said. 鈥淲hat are the attributes that make a story thought-provoking? What are the sequences that might make a movie sad?鈥�
This leads to a recommendation system which makes predictions based on a movie鈥檚 depth and emotional impact.
Grab your popcorn and settle in 鈥� movie night is about to get a whole lot better.
- Rachel Fairbank, College of Natural Sciences and Mathematics