Global crises such as the Syrian refugee situation are brought to life through short VR films.
The United Nations has embraced virtual reality as a new way to raise awareness about the plights of human beings around the world. The UN has created a trio of short VR films with Vrse.works: Clouds Over Sidra, Waves of Grace, and My Mother’s Wing.
My Mother’s Wing follows a Palestinian mother who lost two young sons in a school shelled by Israel during the 2014 Israel-Gaza conflict. The short film is being featured today at the Tribeca Film Festival.
UN senior adviser Gabo Arora, who created the three films with Vrse.works, says he previously explored these types of stories through conventional video. But virtual reality adds another level of immersion to the storytelling.
“The leap into virtual reality was really a constellation of factors coming together to bring this technology to help sensitize people to the challenges we work with throughout the world,” Arora says. “In some ways it’s a revolution for us; in other ways, it’s just a way to drive impact in new and innovative ways.”
Arora says virtual reality can help convey the complexity of many important stories around the world.
“We have limited means and limited resources to do so, so we choose to prioritize pressing issues that have some sense of urgency and an important notion of time and place,” Arora says.
He points to Clouds Over Sidra as an example of showing an intimate picture of an overwhelming situation.