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Competition Immersive Festival de Cannes

#1390: First Edition of Cannes Film Festival Immersive Competition with Elie Lavasseur

May 19, 2024by kentbye

The 77th edition of the Cannes Film Festival is featuring an inaugural Immersive Competition with eight pieces in competition along with six pieces outside of competition. I had a chance to speak with Elie Lavasseur, the Head of Immersive Competition Festival de Cannes, to get a bit more context for how this came about, their curatorial intention, and an overview of the program. I’ve had a chance to see 5 out of the 8 pieces in competition, and all 6 of the non-competition pieces curated by Atlas V in an exhibition titled “exhibition ‘exhibition ‘Cinema Beyond the Frame: An Introduction to Virtual Reality’. I’ll link my Voices of VR podcast coverage down below.

Immersive Competition for Festival de Cannes:

Immersive Selection of Non-competitive works:

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Rough Transcript

[00:00:05.438] Kent Bye: The Voices of VR Podcast. Hello, my name is Kent Bye, and welcome to the Voices of VR Podcast. It's a podcast that looks at the future of spatial computing. You can support the podcast at patreon.com slash voicesofvr. So in today's episode, I'm going to be talking to Elie Levasseur, who is responsible for the first edition of the Immersive Competition at the Cannes Film Festival. So Khan has had a number of different immersive selections in the past, but more are part of the market with Khan XR. And then they've also had some pitch sessions in collaboration with Kaleidoscope VR. But this is the first time that they're actually curating a proper selection of eight pieces in competition. They also have six pieces not in competition, but it's just great to see another A-list festival that is starting to curate immersive storytelling pieces. This flew a little bit under the radar. I hadn't heard about it. I think they sent out some notes to their email list to be able to curate this initial selection. So I've been able to see five out of the eight of the main competition pieces just over the last number of years of being on the film festival circuit. And I'll include some links to some conversations and interviews that I've done with at least four of those pieces. They also have the non-competition pieces that have been curated by Atlas 5 or Atlas V, depends on who you talk to, but six different pieces that have been on the film festival circuit since 2016 at Sundance and then gone up until the last edition of Venice Immersive. So six different pieces that they either help produce or are helping to distribute. So just a great retrospective to see what's happening in the immersive industry as well. So I'll be including some links to some of the conversations that I've had with some of the different pieces that are being featured there. And yeah, I just had a chance to talk to Ellie to get a bit more context as to this coming about, what their intentions were with curating this selection, and where they hope it goes in the future. So that's what we're covering on today's episode of the Voices of VR podcast. So this interview with Eli happened on Friday, May 17, 2024. So with that, let's go ahead and dive right in.

[00:02:02.279] Elie Lavasseur: ELI LEVASSEUR- My name is Eli Levasseur, and I'm responsible for this immersive competition, first edition at the Cannes Film Festival. And before that, I work for a few events specialized in the audiovisual industry and cinema and digital content as well. So actually, the first time I really deal with VR was in 2016 on the marketplace called Cross Video Days in Paris. At that time, we received hundreds, really hundreds of applications on our marketplace using either AR and VR. I thought it was a very strong shift from the transmedia industry towards this new medium. I feel it was like this medium was a perfect combination for people who try to develop more immersive and interactive stuff. I feel really interested in it, and this is why I wanted to specialize.

[00:03:08.229] Kent Bye: Maybe give a bit more context as to your background and your journey into this space.

[00:03:13.567] Elie Lavasseur: Yeah. So after this experiment has crossed video days, I work four years at New Images, which is a festival, you know, specialized immersive content. And I've been responsible for the marketplace there. So I created and I developed this new marketplace where producers had the opportunity to meet with potential curators and cultural programmers.

[00:03:43.291] Kent Bye: Right. Maybe you could give a bit more context to some of the previous iterations of what was referred to as CannesXR, which I know had some collaborations with Kaleidoscope VR, but also was part of the market. And there's also been a previous VR piece of Carnegie Arena that was a part of the immersive selection a number of years ago, 2017. So maybe give a bit more context as to the history of VR with Cannes Film Festival and what's different this year.

[00:04:10.680] Elie Lavasseur: Yeah. So as you say, Cannes Film Festival was, I think, the first festival to select a VR piece is in official selection. And it was in 2017, a piece called Carne y Arena from Alejandro Inarritu. And I think it was a strong move forward from the festival and for the whole XR industry. It was, I think, the first time they had such a recognition. And then I think they had a few additions, but I was not part of it. So it's difficult for me to talk that much about it. But the festival called me in 2019 and 20. to develop a marketplace dedicated to XR. We did mostly a selection of Finnish works and we tried to foster the distribution of these works. It happened that in 2020, we had this pandemic and we had to shift online the whole selection. At that point, we were also developing a new program in partnership with Kaleidoscope, but for project development, we had some pitching session there. And with this pandemic, we have to rethink and revamp totally the program. So we decided to move the program online at the Museum of Other Realities. So we created a few different spaces for project development, for finished projects, and also we had Trivica to cancel his own competition, and they called us to have a collaboration on this. So in the end, we had at the museum, you know, different spaces created by different partners, and I think it was one of the first times actually We had VR PCs presented in a VR space, at least from a festival initiative.

[00:06:08.297] Kent Bye: Okay. Yeah. And I had a chance to attend during the pandemic, the Museum of Other Realities and check out some of the pieces. And so I've attended virtually some of the previous iterations of CannesXR, but now we have Cannes Immersive 2024 with eight pieces and competition and six pieces that are part of the non-competition selection retrospective. And so maybe you could take a step back and talk a bit about how did this come about to have an official selection this year at Cannes 2024?

[00:06:36.112] Elie Lavasseur: Yeah. Selecting one VR piece like we did in 2017, I think it's easy to understand one piece. It's more tricky to understand the medium itself and what we have to do is just to understand whether the immersive medium, is it the future of cinema? Is it an extension of cinema? Is it something different? And I think we need time to step back a little bit just to understand what this medium is about and how we're going to evaluate. And our feeling is like immersive medium is something different than cinema. So as you can understand, there is a few questions we had to answer. Is it really the role of a traditional filmmaking festival to present something which is obviously slightly different than cinema? And I think this is the main question we have to solve on our side.

[00:07:41.195] Kent Bye: Okay, and maybe you could give some of the guiding principles that you were using in order to curate this year's selection.

[00:07:48.159] Elie Lavasseur: Yeah, I think we had like two different objectives. The first one is we wanted our audience to understand that immersive medium is something beyond the technology is a new form of art. And to demonstrate this, we feel like it was interesting to really celebrate the potential of the medium and demonstrate how it can be used to tell different kinds of stories. So this is why we had, with these eight different pieces, we have a different way how to use the medium to tell different stories. The second thing which was important to us is our audience made by mostly professionals coming from the traditional female industry. The challenge was how we can engage them to come to the Cineum and see this piece. One thing is, you know, all these people are really into narrative-driven piece and also by collectiveness. This is something we talked, you know, in previous editions with them and From their feedback, we thought it was really important to bring collective experience because these people, they really want to share emotions and thoughts around the PCs they see. And so we wanted to debunk a little bit this idea that VR is always for individuals and for gamers. So this is the thing that was important for this show.

[00:09:23.621] Kent Bye: Okay. And so there's a selection of eight different pieces. And so I've had a chance to see five of the eight pieces at other festivals. And so you were speaking about some of the collective experiences and Evolver I saw a couple of years ago at Tribeca. And that was certainly a piece that had a collective type of experience from Marshmallow Laser Feast where... You see the inside of a body and it's really exploring these themes of understanding the interconnectedness of ourselves as individuals, but with the world around us. And this is a piece that I found really quite moving. So I'd love to hear some of your thoughts on Evolver.

[00:09:58.223] Elie Lavasseur: Yeah, exactly. I mean, everywhere has, you know, different setup. In our case, the experience is divided into two different rooms. So we have a first room, which is called the meditation room, where it's a kind of onboarding with the voiceover of Kate Blanchett, but it's just an audio experience. And then the users bring into another room where you can see a video projection and you can experience the full VR experience of Evolver. And exactly what I think interesting in this piece is how, I mean, you dive into the body of someone, but it's the connection between what's happening inside your body and with the ecosystem around you. Yeah, I think it's a nice way to talk about all the issues about the environment and make understand people that we are part actually of the same world.

[00:10:59.315] Kent Bye: Yeah. And another piece that I had a chance to see at Venice 2023 was called Human Violins Prelude. But this version that you're showing has another additional component that has a multiplayer component to it, but exploring themes of music and the tragedy of the Holocaust. And so I'd love to hear some of your thoughts on Human Violins Prelude.

[00:11:19.721] Elie Lavasseur: Yeah, so Human Valorance is a piece from Joana Michi, a young Romanian artist. This piece is a story of how music can save your soul when you have to experience some difficult times and in this case holocaust. The artistic direction of this piece is really amazing and I think it's a good example of how as an independent artist and producer you can do really amazing stuff.

[00:11:55.717] Kent Bye: I know that Allard was a piece that showed at Tribeca this past year, which was a collective experience where three people go through at the same time. And there's a lot of volumetric capture with augmented reality, exploring the story of Claudette Glovin. So for me, I think it's one of the better augmented reality stories and documentaries that I've seen that is going from different mediums, from a book to a play to now it's an immersive augmented reality piece that is pulling all these different modalities together with volumetric capture. Let me hear some of your thoughts on colored

[00:12:28.291] Elie Lavasseur: Yeah. Carnaud is the story of an unforeseen teenager who is part of the civil rights movement. But for some reason, Rosa Parks stays in history and she has been forgotten. Her name was Claudette Calvin. But this is a piece from an essay of Tania de Montaigne and directed by Stéphane Foenikinos and Pierre Alengiro. And as I said, I mean, for me, actually, you say one of the best pieces, I would say one of the unique pieces I saw using augmented reality really to develop a narrative-driven story, and in this case, a documentary. And I feel like having these characters from the past within your living room is something that is quite emotional. I see it like, I mean, for me, color is going to be like a millstone, you know, in the history of this art. And I'm pretty sure that in the next few years, it will inspire, you know, some new piece using augmented reality.

[00:13:40.056] Kent Bye: Yeah. And there's a piece that I had a chance to see, Traversing the Mist, which I saw back at DocLab, but this is a trilogy that is very provocative in the sense that it's going into these gay saunas in Taiwan and the director, Tung-Yin Chau, The first one was a 360 video that was showing at Venice 2021. And then there was a gazing in the mist, which was a mixed reality installation, which I didn't have a chance to see, but traversing the mist was a really interesting multiplayer CGI based and some more explicit scenes of going into the gay sauna. Yeah, really quite provocative in the sense that you are all embodying the same character, but it's an installation that you're walking through with two other people at the same time, exploring through these forbidden areas or areas that maybe a lot of people may have never experienced before. But I'd love to hear some of your thoughts on traversing the mist.

[00:14:31.854] Elie Lavasseur: Yeah, for me, I mean, you explain the setup, so it's a multi-user experience. And for me, it's a very good example of how with this medium you can tell some stories which are really intimate and dive into the intimacy of someone. I think it's interesting to see how this medium maybe is developing some new genre. I see a lot of immersive experiences where you are in the shoes of someone or in the head of someone. I think this medium is really appropriate to tell something really intimate, maybe more than cinema. And this one is a very good example of this. And I see how he used the intimacy, but to also develop a story which is about voyeurism. And I think the combination of the two make something that is really powerful.

[00:15:33.470] Kent Bye: And a piece that was showing the first chapter at Tribeca in 2023, and then at SXSW in 2024 with the full version, Maya, The Birth of a Superhero, using Quill illustrations, but in a way that's embedded within Unity, so you have a little bit more interactive components of the story. But really, in my perspective, pushing forward the grammar and language of VR to use this kind of surrealistic magic realism, dream logic to go through these issues of minstrel taboos. I just thought it was really quite powerful how they're using the medium of VR, but also some augmented reality components as well as you have this kind of hand interactions. But yeah, really blending together a lot of different affordances of the medium, but also from my mind, kind of really leaning into this surrealistic dream logic in a way of further developing the grammar and language of using symbolism and archetypes within the context of telling the story. I thought it was really quite powerful what they're doing there.

[00:16:32.233] Elie Lavasseur: Yeah, and I think maybe two things we can add on this is first, Maya was a photographic exhibition. And here, the way how we showcase it is you have the full photography exhibition and the immersive experience is taking place within the exhibition. And I think it's worth it to say because, you know, we speak a lot about onboarding and outboarding in the... I think the way how they set it up is really a good way how you can onboard the people into one universe and then have the immersive experience itself. The second thing I would say on Maya is I think it's a very good example of how you can use interactivity not just to gamify an experience, but to use interactivity for a purpose and to have more impact on the user. Just to illustrate this is I really love the way how actually you use the interactive to empower the user to stop the bullying of the other characters you have in your headset. And I love also the idea that they invite you to take a tampon in your hand because I feel like There is not that much maybe guy who already have this tampon in your hand. And I think this is just symbolic, but I feel like a lot of interactive piece are just putting some interaction, but I don't see really the sense of putting additional interaction. And I think here you have really a sense to it.

[00:18:21.567] Kent Bye: Yeah, the themes that Paul and me and CJ are really trying to counter are the taboos around menstruation. And so I think they're really leaning in some of those different taboos by having these immersive interactive components. So having these virtual interactions with a tampon that goes above and beyond what we've had these physical experiences, especially for a lot of men, don't necessarily have a lot of opportunities to have those types of interactions. And the way that they're using that to really amplify the nature of the taboos, but to really counteract it through transmuting those taboos into a superhero power, which I think is really quite an interesting alchemical transmutation that they're doing here in that piece. So yeah, so that's a really provocative piece. I'm really curious to see the reaction to the crowds there. And then I guess moving on, there's a couple of pieces that I haven't had a chance to see. And so maybe you could say a few words about Un Amour. Yeah.

[00:19:12.748] Elie Lavasseur: So Onamore is a video projection installation, which is also interactive. And it's at the crossroad of visual art and performing art. Claire B and Adrian M coming from the performing arts sector. And here the story, it's a love story and also a separation story. And there is a very poetic text telling by the voiceover of Claire. And the images are also very inspirational, very visual. I think if you look at the picture of the piece, it's really mind-blowing and beautiful. I saw we already started to open the sessions and I saw a few people in tears at the end.

[00:20:07.950] Kent Bye: Nice. Yeah, you've had a few days of having the festival ongoing here that you've had some crowds in there and everything. And so you've got a couple other pieces that I want to cover, which is the Talos I, which is a world premiere that you're showing there. So I'd love to hear some more context for Talos I.

[00:20:23.254] Elie Lavasseur: Yeah, so Telos One is a piece from a director called Emile Sidel and a choreographer called Dorothea Zaccali. And the story of Telos is, you know, at the end of the Mankind era. what AI could do without the mankind. They would have to think about what is their purpose out of if there is no mankind. So this is a story about an AI who try to develop a physical body. And visually, I mean, the piece is a projection, a video projection on a pyramid And on each face of the pyramid, then you can see a different scene, which is mainly the choreography.

[00:21:11.877] Kent Bye: Nice. And the final piece in competition is called The Roaming, which looks like film noir, immersive experience, and so maybe could give a bit more context for The Roaming.

[00:21:20.421] Elie Lavasseur: Yeah, the rooming is really, I mean, this is a combination of cinema, theater, and immersive experience. What is interesting in this piece is there is some live actors and some props. And I think it's a good combination about something which is developing CGI with virtual characters, but mixed with live action actors, which are captured live with volumetric technology. And I think also what is interesting is you have at the end to touch some water. So there is this mix of virtual world but also connected with real materials and props.

[00:22:09.215] Kent Bye: And you also this year are having a non-competition selection that you're looking at the evolution of the medium. In your description, you're saying you're drawing parallels between virtual reality, virtual production, cinema, and collective storytelling. And so maybe give a bit more context for the immersive selection of non-competitive works.

[00:22:29.049] Elie Lavasseur: Yeah. So yeah, you used the word. I mean, the idea behind this is we have been inspired by exhibitions you can find in a museum. For instance, when you have famous painters and the curators bring some additional context about the creation process or how this artist can be positioned in the story of paintings. We wanted to replicate this model to VR because I think it's never been done before, or really been done before, at least from a festival side. The idea here is really to give some context about how these works have been created. how we can include them within the story of the cinema and the techniques. So six pieces from Atlas V's studio, because I think Atlas V has this amazing catalogue of XR pieces that really have been some millstones in the short history of this medium. And also, I think it's a good example of a studio who tried to develop some pieces which are inspired by cinema, but using the medium. And I think it was a good example for the audience we have to bring them at the exhibition.

[00:23:58.985] Kent Bye: Yeah, I know that I've seen a number of these different pieces, and I actually have some unpublished interviews that I'm going to try to get out, kind of reflect upon some of the coverage that I've done over the years, but also a retrospective of the evolution of the medium, going all the way back to Sundance 2016 with Notes on Blindness, and then Spears, which showed at Sundance 2018, and then moving into both Battlescar, which I thought It's really pushing forward with animation and the grammar and storytelling language of VR. And then using animation also within Gloomy Eyes that was showing Sundance 2019. And then a couple other pieces that I've seen more recently within the last couple of years with Missing Pictures. I had a number of different episodes, but it looks like you're showing one episode there. And then also Emperor, which took a prize at Venice Immersive 2023. So... Yeah, really strong selection showing a lot of different genres from documentary into like animation. But each of them are really diving into new ways of telling stories with the immersive medium of VR. So yeah, ALBIS 5 has certainly been on the forefront of distributing a lot of these different pieces. And I think this is really strong representation. If you were to kind of give people a primer of what's been happening for the past eight or nine years within the context of immersive storytelling, this is a really great selection of six pieces.

[00:25:16.274] Elie Lavasseur: Yeah, I mean, as I said before, I mean, the idea here is really to put the six pieces from Ratas V in the context of the story of the techniques and the cinema. So we have a big wall, you know, with all the main titles from cinema and from VR. And we have also all the major dates regarding how the technology around cinema have evolved. I mean, for someone who doesn't know that much about the medium, you can understand where we come from, because I think XR, using moving images and sounds, we have, of course, the cinema in heritage, maybe also theater, games, and performing arts. But I think it's good to understand where we come from, so you can better maybe understand where you're going. We have also some videos that explain all the different species. You have some interviews about the creators, the directors, the producers, and we can give more context about how these species have been created.

[00:26:29.338] Kent Bye: Amazing. And looking at Atlas 5's Instagram, they have some shots of some of the installation that they have of cinema beyond the frame, an introduction to virtual reality. It seems like it's a whole like museum installation there of kind of going into the history of immersive storytelling and Yeah, just some great graphs and more historical context. And so I can imagine that people coming to see some of these different experiences may want to start to curate some of these different things into like location-based entertainment. A lot of these different immersive festivals like Carnegie Arena premiered there at Cannes in 2017 and then went on and to show it in a lot of different museum contexts throughout the United States and Canada and around the world. And so, yeah, it feels like curators for museums and other location-based entertainment. And I know that Atlas V has also got an application on Apple Vision Pro and some of the different experiences like Blooming Eyes and Battlescar. And so, yeah, just thinking about more distribution options for these pieces above and beyond the film festival circuit, it's great to see another AAA festival like Kahn start to have an official selection that could help promote the distribution of these pieces in certain contexts. So I don't know if distribution is something that is coming up or if you have any thoughts or reflections on the state of distribution and how Kahn can start to play a part in helping to promote some of these pieces to have lies beyond the festival circuit.

[00:27:52.523] Elie Lavasseur: Yeah, I mean, I think we all agree on the point that distribution is key and is actually maybe one of the major issues the community have to solve. I mean, this is the beginning of the story. And if I can do a parallel with cinema, you know, at the beginning, we miss just the place where to enjoy the cinema collectively. And we have to do it in cafes, in fairs. So I think we were quite at the same stage here. We miss a venue which is really dedicated to immersive, but maybe on our side, I mean, on the creative side, we have also maybe to standardize a bit the techniques because if we want to foster the distribution, then maybe we have to do a little bit more on this. But the way I see it is I think the more we have some good pieces i think at one point i mean i don't have any doubt that this kind of experiences meet the public expectation if you go at the exit of immersive exhibition then you heard all the comments and i mean for the majority of the audience it's really something mind-blowing so i don't see any difficulty to convince the public But I see a difficulty to how to reach them. And that's true that we have here two options, Atom and LocationBase. Atom is a bit difficult because people need to buy more headsets. And it's true that it's not already mass market. I don't know if it's something that we're going to have in the near future. but right now I think for me there is like untapped opportunities with museums and cultural venues because there is like plenty of them you know in every countries there is full of places where the audience is already there from you know young kids to 60, 70 years old people. And yeah, I think we should take this opportunity to disable the content. The thing is maybe as a festival, we can maybe help to connect these two different worlds. I mean, people coming maybe from the audiovisual or performing arts industry with the curators of these museums and cultural venues. And this is something we'll think about, you know, is to develop a marketplace. Another way maybe we can help is, since we have this exhibition, we might think about how to make it tour in different venues and bring, you know, some additional revenues also for the artists we select.

[00:30:46.872] Kent Bye: It's a really good callback to the early days of cinema, of the phase that's often referred to by academics as the cinema of attractions, when films may be shown at a festival or a carnival or something as before, like there was movie theaters that were these dedicated spaces where you would go have the more optimal experience to see a film. And so we're kind of in that similar cinema of attractions type of phase where you have to go to a film festival like Cannes or Sundance New Frontier or Tribeca Immersive or Southwest XR Experience or Venice Immersive or at the DocLab, a number of these different festivals that have created these dedicated spaces for trying to optimize both the onboarding and offboarding and installations and trying to find the best ways for the general public to come see these pieces above and beyond seeing them at their homes. Whereas some of these different pieces need to have specific hardware and haptics and smells, but also like collective experiences. And so yeah, I really feel like the festival circuit has been at the forefront of trying to define ways that you really optimally exhibit these pieces and then other cultural institutions like museums and other location-based entertainment places can take those insights and start to then adopt those and to have other ways for these pieces to have lives beyond the festival. So yeah, I think all those things are happening there at these festivals, like you said. Um, yeah, I guess since you have been going for the last couple of days of how has it been going so far and maybe could just talk about the logistics of like where it's at located to the rest of the festival and what it's been like to have crowds come through and start to see some of these pieces and some of the reactions you're seeing so far.

[00:32:29.225] Elie Lavasseur: Yeah. The exhibition takes place at the Cineum, which is a multiplex, which is 25 minutes from the Palais. The cool thing is that the Cineum is used to screen all the selections from the official competition of the Cannes Film Festival. So the audience have been used to come here in the last three years. I think there are 35,000 people there last year. And I think, yeah, the exhibition is on the ground floor. It's 1,300 meters square. So the visibility is quite interesting, I think, here. So, yeah, the reactions are pretty good. I think, you know, the idea of having, you know, collective experiences with this very nice setup is, I think, something really worth it because, you know, the public who are not used to get to immersive exhibition can see something prior coming to the cinema. And I think it's important, you know, to... give them the willingness to come because there is still a shuttle to take. But I think these visuals are pretty strong and give the public looks eager to come. And I have to say that from the beginning, we are full booked. At the moment, we have more than 2,000 seats who have been already booked. So yeah, I think it's a good start.

[00:34:03.453] Kent Bye: You mentioned because it is such a new medium, it's tied to certain aspects of the cinematic tradition where just the power of strong stories can be really highlighted and featured at these festivals. But yet at the same time, these immersive stories are something that's unique and different that goes above and beyond what the cinematic tradition is. And so I'd love to hear some reflections on this as a competition and if it's going to be included in the same context of the Cannes Awards and how you start to think about how this immersive selection relates to the broader selection there at the Cannes Film Festival.

[00:34:39.195] Elie Lavasseur: Yeah, I mean, this competition is part of the festival, but if your question is why we don't have an award delivered within the official awards ceremony at Cannes, the question here is, do we want to recognize an artist and a piece, or do we want to recognize the medium? I understand that if you recognize artists and pieces, then in a way you have to recognize the medium. But there is also another reflection to have is if we want to position this medium as a new form of art, as something which has to be considered by the media and the audience as something different than cinema. then maybe I'm not sure it's a good strategy to give an award within the same ceremony. This is the first point. And the second point is, I feel like we should not be ashamed about what we are. I mean, I think this medium is really mind-blowing. We can do amazing stuff with it. So if we do something which is separate, I'm sure that we can also revamp the idea of a clothing ceremony and put this medium as a real star of the ceremony, the medium and the artist. And I'm sure that if you create this kind of ceremony in Cannes, I don't see why all the people here won't come. And I think we have this ability to attract these people to us and not be just a follower of what is already existing because What is true is like our artists are not as popular as famous directors and actress in the cinema. But if you want to reach that, I think we need time. I know that we are living in a society where, you know, a lot of people expect to become a star in two minutes. But if we speak about the recognition of medium, then I think we need like more time. My feeling is if actress and actors and directors are so famous now, it's because we have more than one century of history. We have maybe billions of people who watch a radio movie. So this is why cinema is so popular. But on our side, I think we should first reach the audience, make sure that a lot of people are able to experience what we are doing, and once we have like a billion of people experiencing this kind of medium then i'm sure the recognition of the medium will be there and all the creators and the directors and the people creating this stuff gonna be popular but i mean i think it's an illusion if you think that with a price in can you will have a recognition of a medium i think this is just an illusion

[00:37:42.250] Kent Bye: Yeah, and I think I definitely see all those points. And I think what I've seen in the industry has been a slow split approach with a number of different festivals that have started to integrate it, almost like a new genre of film or the cinematic tradition where there's documentary awards and short films and, you know, there's immersive selections that are a part of festivals like Venice and as well as South by Southwest, Tribeca and DocLab. But then the Peabody Awards added additional immersive selection, and then Emmys have a special selection. There isn't one for the Academy Awards yet, because that hasn't been, I guess, the mass publication of these different immersive experiences. But Haunted Arena did actually win a special Academy Award. So I feel like what I see happening is the expansion of the cinematic tradition with recognizing of these pieces. And for me, I go back to just storytelling and that this is new ways of telling stories. And there's also completely different award ceremonies for gaming. And even gaming has little sections for immersive. So immersive has been treated as a genre in the context of other media. But I think as we move forward, maybe we'll have a very specific way of honoring it as a unique tradition that's independent of the other previous either gaming or cinematic traditions.

[00:38:57.292] Elie Lavasseur: But I think this is not, in our case, I mean, I don't know about other festivals, but in our case, I think what we want to do is, as I said, we don't want to look at the genre or an extension of cinema. I think it's really important to make understand, yeah, as I said at the beginning, I mean, it's really important to make the media and the audience understand that this is something different and must be treated as something different. I mean, and this is actually our position, then other can have different point of view, but I think this is all really important.

[00:39:34.320] Kent Bye: Great. And as we start to wrap up, I'd love to hear some of your thoughts of what you think the ultimate potential of immersive storytelling might be and what it might be able to enable.

[00:39:46.428] Elie Lavasseur: Yeah, for me, we are obviously at the beginning of the medium, but I think the ultimate quest of all this experience, it's to recreate what we can all experience every day as a dream. you know, to be immersed in something that we can really believe in and we can drive some real emotions. And then you woke up and you realize that, okay, that was just a fiction or something which is not real. And I think behind this medium, there is this quest to be able to recreate what our brain is creating every day, but the ability to recreate this kind of experience. This is what I'm looking for. I'm not sure it's going to happen tomorrow, but I think we are on this journey to be able to create this.

[00:40:41.133] Kent Bye: Anything else that's left unsaid that you'd like to say to the broader immersive community?

[00:40:47.369] Elie Lavasseur: Please look at the program and if you can, still time to come and to enjoy our experiences. And otherwise, I will be happy to welcome you next year.

[00:41:01.078] Kent Bye: Awesome. Well, Ellie, thanks so much for joining me to give a bit more context for the first official selection for the Festival of the Cannes in 2024, the 77th edition of the festival, having for the first time an official selection of immersive stories. There are eight pieces in competition and six pieces that are part of the non-competition selection curated by Atlas 5. Yeah, just really great to see. I know that folks to welcome him to the scene and to see where all this goes in the future with trying to establish these new forms of immersive storytelling, but also just to see how it's playing into the broader ecosystem for promoting this as a new form of storytelling, a new art form that is going above and beyond what has come before with a cinematic tradition. So thanks again for taking the time to help explain this year's selection and hopefully it's going well and looking forward to where it goes in the future. Thank you, Clint. So that was Eli Levstor. He's the chief curator and responsible for putting together the first edition of the Immersive Competition at the Cannes Film Festival. So of a number of different takeaways about this interview is that, first of all, well, I could definitely see that there's a need to have XR and immersive storytelling be its own thing independent of the prior traditions but i think that a lot of the cultural institutions that are out there have existing infrastructure and you know i personally think it helps immersive storytelling even more if it's included as a sub-genre of these other cinematic traditions or game traditions just like we have within the emmys or peabody awards or other film festivals like venice south by southwest and tribeca and if a doc lab So my perspective is that I think it just helps to focus it more on the storytelling rather than the technology. But that said, I think it is worth reflecting that we are in this kind of like cinema of attractions phase of VR where it's associated with these other events and other attractions. In this case, it's the film festival scene or in the context of, you know, location based entertainment or museums. So maybe ultimately we'll come upon in the far distant future, just like we go to a cinema to see a film, maybe there'll be other exhibition formats for XR that will be developed and prototyped at these film festivals, but also at these museums and location-based entertainment places. Yeah, really focusing on a lot of multiplayer type of experiences, but also some narratives as well. Interestingly enough, no 360 videos that are being featured within this first selection. Only 14 total pieces, eight in competition, and six that were kind of retrospective from the film festival circuit that had Atlas V be involved in some capacity, either producing or distributing it. So, yeah, just really great to see another major film festival have an official selection within competition. And just in terms of like the cadence over the course of the year, usually it's like Sundance New Frontier, which has taken another year off this year that would usually start the festival season off at the beginning of the year in January and then South by Southwest and then Tribeca and then. Venice immersive, and then if a doc lab, and those are the festivals that tend to have a lot of like world premieres. So folks that are showing things for the very first time, and then you end up having subsequent regional festivals or other places that certainly still have a number of different world premieres or international premieres. But it'll be interesting to see how this coming in the middle between South by Southwest and Tribeca to see how much of some of the different places choose to premiere at one place or another. And this is within a month of Tribeca that is coming up next month, which we're still waiting to hear their formal lineup that is going to be announced here soon. I will not be able to make it. Like I said, there's been a family medical situation that is limiting my travel this year. So yeah, I'll include in the show notes some links to previous conversations. Like I said, during the intro and during the conversation, I've had a chance to see five out of the eight pieces in competition. And I've done interviews with four of those different creators. And I've also done interviews with all the different pieces that are being featured within their non-competition selection that was curated by Atlas 5. But I've actually not published some of the stuff with like Battlescar and Gloomy Eyes. And so I actually need to go back into my backlog and hopefully I'll be able to get those out within the next couple of weeks or so just to dig into and do a little bit of a retrospective of what's happening with Atlas 5 because they've been a huge proponent of really pushing forward the medium of virtual reality, not only in their own pieces that they've helped to direct and produce, but also in helping to distribute and get pieces being featured there just to kind of do this retrospective look of how the medium of immersive storytelling has been evolving. Lots of really great public support within the context of France that has been helping to facilitate the context for a place like Atlas V to exist and to get the funding, but also all these co-productions that they've been doing over the years. Just great to see a little bit of a retrospective. A number of these different pieces are available if you want to check them out. And actually, within the Apple Vision Pro, there's Gloomy Eyes and Battlescar as well that have immersive versions that are on the Apple Vision Pro, but they're also on the Quest as well. So anyway, that's all that I have for today. And I just wanted to thank you for listening to the Voices of VR podcast. And if you enjoy the podcast, then please do spread the word, tell your friends, and consider becoming a member of the Patreon. This is a supported podcast, and so I do rely upon donations from people like yourself in order to continue to bring you this coverage. So you can become a member and donate today at patreon.com slash voices of VR. Thanks for listening.

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#1390: First Edition of Cannes Film Festival Immersive Competition with Elie Lavasseur