The Cambridge Film Festival this year is hosting its first ever virtual reality screenings. Kicking it off on the 21st was WONDERFUL YOU: a virtual reality journey through the key developmental stages in a foetus’ senses: Sight, Sound, Smell, Taste and Touch. This virtual reality masterpiece is written and directed by John Durrant and narrated by the Academy award nominee Samantha Morton. It weaves stunning special effects with hauntingly beautiful music that make you feel as if you’ve stepped into the world of the foetus. The contrasts in the film are stunning- sometimes a disturbingly large baby dominates your view, other times highly detailed kaleidoscopes representing different smells almost blind you.
The VR experience is intimat e- hosted in a small room in Emmanuel College with only four other people, you have your own Oculus Rift (the device placed around your eyes that totally immerses you in a 3D space) and a pair of headphones that block out all noises. Furthermore, the journey through the first nine months of life is also interactive- you are given your own little remote to navigate the different senses at your leisure. You’ll feel like you alone are witnessing the incredible miracle that is the developing foetus. Balancing scientific facts with gorgeous metaphors, the film informs but also entertains. Starry orbs flash around your eyes as you focus in on different menus for the senses- menus that allow you to see how the baby reacts to outside stimuli. You can tickle its feet, make it smell flowers and sneeze, you can even sing it a lullaby! Within every menu there is a short informational segment narrated by Morton. Her calm voice talks you through the developing appendages needed for the senses to develop, from when you are a collection of cells to having a fully functioning eye. You feel safe, protected- just like the baby in it’s mother’s womb.
Balancing scientific facts with gorgeous metaphors, the film informs but also entertains.
The immense details are a testament to the skill of this rapidly developing technology. Blue veins can be seen beneath the foetus’ skin, hairs on it’s head flutter and there are even lines on the palms of it’s little hands. Vibrant reds and pinks, flashing greens and blues, dust clouds of purples and yellows- every colour of the rainbow is displayed and works in harmony with the rest of the piece. Each individual sense has highly detailed graphics – the swirling circles of a foetus’ fingertips, the rises and dips of the taste buds on a tongue, the branching lines of neurons in the brain. The original music, composed by Timo Baker is soft, soothing- but achingly beautiful and awe-inspiring. Violins shiver as you watch the foetus develop its first sense (the ear canal), and then grow to a crescendo as the foetus smiles in pleasure.
The overall experience is astounding. Who knew that the development of a foetus was so intricate? The VR experience is essential for this piece as it fully immerses you in the world that we have all been a part of, but cannot remember. The beginning of your life is captured in such a way that only two words can accurately sum it up: wonderful you.