Study case: interactive animations

Hi all,
I work doing research on activity recognition inside vehicles, the idea is to recognize how the driver interacts with objects inside the cabin of a vehicle; e.g. reach, grasp and use a mobile phone, food, bottles, etc.
What I’d like to have: a game character in a sitting position who reaches for objects in front of him depending on the object selected by me with a click of the mouse. In other words, I’d like to have the possibility of interacting with the character by selecting the objects the character should reach/grasp. The location of objects should not be predefined but specified in real-time.
I’ll appreciate your help and suggestions and even more if you guys can create a very simple level that implements these basic ideas.
Thanks in advance,
Boris