'Arden's Wake' wins Best Virtual Reality Award in Venice

World
Europe

The short film "Arden's Wake" directed by Eugene YK Chung won the Best Virtual Reality Award at the 74th Venice Film Festival Saturday evening.

The prize is the highest recognition for works devoted to virtual reality (VR), a new category for the Venice Film Festival.

"Arden's Wake" is a 16-minute-long animated feature telling the story of a little girl who lives with her father on the water.

Penrose Studios Photo

All three prizes were delivered by the president of the VR jury, US director John Landis, at an award ceremony before the announcement of the major Golden Lion Award.

Chung thanked the festival's organizers for "taking a chance and a leap of faith on virtual reality."

"This is a new art form, and it is an incredible honor that the world's oldest film festival has embraced for the first time this art form in the official competition," he said.

The maker of Arden's Wake shares the joy on twitter. /Gif via Twitter

A Best VR Experience Award (for interactive content) went to "La camera insabbiata" by artists Laurie Anderson and Hsin-Chien Huang, a VR installation that allows viewers to lose themselves in a fully interactive, and immersive animated journey.

A Best VR Story Award (for linear content) went to "Bloodless" by South Korean filmmaker Gina Kim. Based on a true story, the 12-minute-long VR film recounts the last moments of life of a sex worker, who was brutally killed by an American soldier in a US army camp-town in South Korea in the early 1990s.

Venice is the first major film festival in the world to have launched a competitive section solely for virtual reality works.

With 22 titles in the competition, the VR program allowed visitors to experience the newest applications of VR technology in three different ways: a theater to watch screenings on rotating white chairs allowing for a 360-degree view; an Oculus stand to watch interactive works; and finally, installations.

The VR section closed on September 5, registering over 3,000 visitors, according to organizers.

(Top photo credit: Penrose Studios.)

7900km

Source(s): Xinhua News Agency