Welcome to Pine Point was my first taste of interactive documentaries and totally got me hooked. I first experienced Welcome to Pine Point at DOXA Film Festival 2011 while participating in the Kris Anderson DOXA Youth Connexions Forum for emerging female filmmakers (where I made this little film). Welcome to Pine Point was like looking into a shoe-box of photos, video footage and personal history combined. It’s the story of growing up, revisiting your childhood, and how things you think will always be the same, change.

I experienced Assent by Oscar Raby and Katy Morrison at the Sundance Film Festival 2015, when we were there with Project Syria (directed by Nonny de la Peña). It combined personal memory with the ability to walk through and explore family history. The exhibition space was designed to look like Oscar’s teenage bedroom, complete with posters and a vintage computer setup. You sat down on his bed, or at his desk and entered Oscar’s personal experience. Through Oscar’s virtual world we step into his father’s perspective as an army officer when the “Caravan of Death” comes to his regiment following the Chilean coup of 1973. It’s personal, it’s powerful, and shares a horrible experience that has forever impacted their relationship.

My friend and collaborator Milan showed me this autobiographical game, Dys4ia, while I was working on Homestay. At the time, I was grapling with telling the story of Taro’s death by suicide and trying to find a way to share this complex experience with an audience in a clear way. Anna Anthropy powerfully creates understanding and empathy in the player by sharing her personal story in Dys4ia. It shares with the audience the experience of gender dysphoria and hormone treatments through short games like navigating the dangers of the bathroom.

I first heard of That Dragon, Cancer when I was knee deep in research and development on Homestay. It was created by Ryan and Amy Green to honour their son, Joel, who passed away from from cancer. The game also shares their deeply personal experience of processing his death. Like the creators, I too was trying to process death and make sense of loss through interactive media. I wonder if it worked for them? I know the experience creating Homestay and sharing the experience of loss with audiences has made me (and my whole family) feel less alone and more connected with people. It’s definitely been therapeutic and helped us heal.

K-Town ‘92 is an interactive documentary created by American documentary filmmaker Grace Lee, that deals with the LA uprisings of 1992. Lee, of Korean heritage, frames the documentary with the question “Who gets to tell the story?” K-Town’92 allows audiences to click on and isolate juxtaposing interviews from 1992 and 2017 and archival footage. Multiple perspectives exist in the same frame. The interviews are powerful and passionate from a range of perspectives. The audio is triggered by the placement of your cursor. You have the ability to silence, or amplify, the voices of the people telling their story. How you navigate the documentary shapes the story you leave with. Lee emphasizes that “these images profoundly shaped my understanding of race in America and the need for people of color to tell our own stories.”

I’d classify this VR experience as a magical realism documentary. You can read my full reflection and play by play of the project here (https://bit.ly/2PjNmwI). The whole project - entry room, holding cell, virtual experience, reflection space - is experienced solo. It’s extremely personal as you are alone with your experience of what you see, hear, and feel. You connect with other people’s stories deeply in a dark corridor where you come face to face with the people whose stories are shared in the VR experience. You realize the faces you are seeing are the same individuals who traveled with in the virtual world. By pairing the animated narrative VR experience with the actual, true stories of immigrants and refugees from Mexico and Central America who have crossed the border into the US, the experience is brought home for the audience. Suddenly what is ‘just a film’ is real. You can’t make up the emotion and feeling that comes through when they look you in the eye and share their story.

The purists who read this will say it’s not a documentary. They are right - It isn’t. But I think it’s rooted in truth enough to sneak onto this list. This VR film was written by Rosario Perazolo Masjoan based on her personal experiences (listen to her TED Talk). Delfina Diaz Gavier plays Juana in the recreation of Rosario’s story. It explores her life as an 18-year-old in a wheelchair. exploring sexuality and dating. Through playful animation, Juana’s vivid imaginative and internal life are revealed in 360 degrees. Sharing the virtual space creates a deep personal connection between the audience and Juana. The audience is immersed in her space, and experiences her journey with her, witnessing how disability and sexuality are viewed by the people around her. Read more about the creative team’s attention to detail and creative process here.