Virtually enlightened

A still from the VR short film The Golden Ray shot in Jaisalmer from Enlightenrsquos The Unnamed Guide seriesLast Monday evening we waited in line at Bombay Art Societys curiouslooking building at Bandra Reclamation to be among the first to watch three virtual reality VR short films In total the films are nine minutes long we are asked to wait for 45 minutes for our turn on the VR kit As we chat with others in the queue a young Symbiosis media graduate in his early twenties confidently claims that itrsquos just going to be a matter of months before VR becomes the next big thing with the cityrsquos filmmaking and filmgoing folk As we observe the line not bad for a public holiday on Ganesh Utsav we wonder if he is right It is not just the young film enthusiasts who are around bouncy children the elderly and silkclad couples who have returned from the dayrsquos puja activity are part of the motley crowdWhen itrsquos finally our turn associates help us wear the VR kit on the heads as gracefully as possible The films are part of an ongoing series from Enlighten called The Unnamed Guide The title of the series should be a pretty big hint Three guides the wellversed kinds who orate with the full flavour of dialect and local knowledge take you through three scenarios mdash how Satyajit Rayrsquos Sonar Kella helped Jaisalmer secure a place in tourism heaven the swordsmiths of Bundi and the creation of the universe in Pushkar Once we have settled our eyes into the kit the assistant says casually ldquoFeel free to move aroundrdquo And thatrsquos when it hits us mdash the difference between a screen and a VR kitWith this rookie experience of VR films we ask Pranav Ashar the creator of the ongoing series how audiences responded to the ldquoscreeningrdquo Ashar 28 is a familiar name with cinema connoisseurs he founded Enlighten in 2008 a film society that made it cool to watch a Kurosawa or a Truffaut classic on a Sunday afternoon Under the Enlighten label Ashar initiated Matterden CFC which functions out of theatres across India including Deepak Cinema Lower Parel Having made short films right from his teenage years Ashar has returned to filmmakingHeadgears and earphones in place attendees both young and old at The Unnamed Guidersquos official launch last Monday at Bombay Art Society PICSENLIGHTENIs VR then his newfound love Ashar passionately disagrees ldquoAt Enlighten we are interested in storytelling and the art of filmmaking We donrsquot want to put the medium ahead of the storytellingrdquo he explains For The Unnamed Guide therefore he says that VR was the obvious choice ldquoIf you are standing in one of those places depicted in the films you will obviously want to look around VR allows the possibility to give people a 360 view of the spacerdquo he saysThe Unnamed Guide is planned as a series of 70 short films which means Ashar still has 67 more to go He has already finished shooting at Nalanda and the coming weeks will take him to Hampi Ajanta and Ellora He hopes that the rest will be ready by next year when India celebrates 70 years of independence Among the three short films that we saw we tell Ashar that our favourite was The Flowering where we are flung into a universe of twinkling lights as a guide talks about Brahma and Gayatri in Pushkar ldquoIf you listen carefully you will realise that the guide is giving you a cosmic truth in two minutesrdquo he responds Or you could be like us and think it was a trippy 70s psychedelic grooveBut our reaction is not far from what Ashar intended when he says that next month he will release the first part of a VR feature film titled Enlighten Yoga ldquoCarl Saganrsquos television series Cosmos inspired an entire generation in the 1980s to look beyond I want to do something similar with Enlighten Yoga but instead of going macro I want to take it to a micro level What happens to the bodyrdquo says Ashar clarifying that this film will have nothing spiritual and philosophical Another film that Enlighten will release ldquoas soon as possiblerdquo is all we are told is Dreamboy mdash set in a classroom where your dreams get manifested into reality the next morningAll these films mdash The Unnamed Guide Dreamboy and Yoga mdash are not what you would have thought VR could do Perhaps a thriller a detective plot or a horror flick would have been more expected to go with the technology than these relatively alternative themes ldquoThose would have been too obvious and easy to create I wanted to get into this fullthrottle and not be caught up in pretensionrdquo says AsharThere was a time whether with Enlightenrsquos screenings or evenings at Deepak Cinema when the point was to drive a community to theatres to watch a film Will VR viewing mdash with the headgears rather than a common screen mdash kill that collective joy of popcorn and coy kisses Are we moving towards a more private viewing experience Ashar says that it is something filmmakers need to figure out in the coming months even as VR technology improves by leaps and bounds ldquoThe social part needs to evolve along with the technological Unless the tech melts into the background it cannot become mainstreamrdquo he answers