The Guanajuato International Film Festival, aware of the importance and impact that new technologies have on the film industry, is the first film festival to produce three Virtual Reality films.
Since 2014, during the first edition of Hack GIFF, which saw the birth of projects that were later exhibited at the Cannes Film Festival’s NEXT program, the production and development of virtual reality, augmented reality and immersion video set the stage to incorporate technological design into cinema, seen from realization all the way the spectator’s experience. Continuing down this path, in the year 2016, GIFF became the first film festival in Latin America to have a Virtual Reality Screening Room where spectators could enjoy two world premieres.
Seeking to further explore new formats in the seventh art, now GIFF is the first festival to produce original Virtual Reality content. To meet this goal we’ve invited three of the most renowned Mexican filmmakers, both nationally and internationally: Roberto Fiesco, director of the award-winning films Quebranto and Trémulo; Carlos Hagerman, director of Los que se quedan, Vuelve a la vida and El patio de mi casa, and Juan Carlos Rulfo, known for Carrière 250 metros and Del olvido al no me acuerdo.
These three admired directors make up the Ópera Orbis project, an exciting challenge that lead these filmmakers to breaking the formal paradigms of cinema by each shooting a Virtual Reality project under the premise of exploring new creative processes, such as phasing a spherical image and 360º sound. Ópera Orbis joins the many works with which GIFF seeks to widen its cinematic palate every year and keep the avant-garde vision it’s known for.
The Ópera Orbis Gala Premier will be at the Teatro Juárez today. At 4:00 p.m., we will be able to enjoy three magnificent productions in Virtual Reality: Sitting in a Tree K-I-S-S-I-N-G, by Carlos Hagerman, about a group of teenagers play hide and seek in the woods until an innocent prank gets out of hand; La Roca, by Juan Carlos Rulfo, where all begins with a selfie of his father sitting on a great rock on the summit of a mountain: a lunar space that stimulates the sense to travel to the past, and; Péplum, by Roberto Fiesco, who introduces us at the “Strength and Health” gym, where there’s a contest to select Mr. Silao out of 20 young men who train hard to win that title.
The films will also be screened at in the VR Screening Room of Epicentro GIFF, located in the Casa Conde Rul in front of Plaza de la Paz, from Wednesday 26 to Saturday 29 July.
Do not miss GIFF’s Ópera Orbis!