Of
all the countries you could immerse yourself in, Pakistan probably would not be
anywhere near the top of your list, due to its reputation for terrorism and
intolerance. Of course, it does not have to be that way. Many activists (including
some gutsy women) are getting involved on a grass roots level to spur positive
change. Two-time Oscar-winner Sharmeen Obaid-Chinoy literally brings viewers
into their lives in her virtual reality documentary series Look But With Love, the first two episodes of which are available
for viewing today and tomorrow as part of the Convergence showcase at the 55th New York Film Festival.
In
the first episode, “A Story of Women,” a group of young Pakistani women, who
have never really enjoyed full rights of civic participation, are completing
their SWAT training to directly battle terrorism. Obviously, the weapons drills
and rappelling down buildings well suits the 360 VR. This is real deal
counter-terror training, most definitely including bomb disposal.
There
were times when LBWL inadvertently
hinted at VR’s potential for the horror genre, because there are several
instances when you suddenly realize heavily armed people are standing next to
you. Hey there. It also illustrates one of the potential drawbacks for
documentary filmmakers, because headset-wearers might find they miss subtitles
with presumably useful information, because they are too busy looking around,
gawking at the training compound. That’s a rather unique problem of viewers
getting too absorbed in a film.
The
second episode, “A Story of Dance,” profiles a distinguished but still spry
dance teacher, who instructs her young students (girls and boys) in traditional
dance forms, despite the Islamist prohibitions. She does indeed often find
herself defending her dance lessons against radicalized parents, but she has a
knack of winning them over. Her appeals to their pride in Pakistani culture and
the beauty of the performances she stages mostly do the trick.
As
you would expect, the dancing nicely lends itself to VR documentation. It is
sort of like Wim Wenders’ Pina raised
to the power of ten. For a while, there was a mini-boomlet in 3D documentaries
that seems to have subsided. Perhaps that energy has been redirected into VR,
because if you are going to do something, you might as well do it all the way.
