Canadian producers C.S. Roy and Stéphanie Morissette (“Les Affamés,” “Vic + Flo Saw A Bear”) have unveiled a first look at “V F C,” an adaptive feature project blending traditional filmmaking with biofeedback audio technology.
The project marks C.S. Roy’s directorial debut and stars Elisapie Isaac, the Inuk singer-songwriter, as a female neuroscientist who develops a rare form of melophobia after experiencing a musical Stendhal Syndrome. Witnessing her colleagues strangely changing behaviour over repeated exposure with the same piece of music, she flees and tries to find shelter away from a pervasive, music-filled environment.
“V F C,” both an arthouse horror movie and an augmented reality experience, allows each viewer to hear a customized soundtrack and musical score based on real-time biofeedback through a pair of EEG (electroencephalogram) headsets and headphones.
Along Isaac, “V F C” stars Etienne Lou, Matthew Kabwe (“The Bold Type”, Justin Laramée (“Mommy”), and newcomer Ambica Sharma. The film shot in Montreal and the Eastern Townships in Quebec in April.
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Key crew members include the cinematographer Stephanie Weber Biron (“Nadia Butterfly,” “I Killed My Mother”), and sound designer Olivier Calvert (Denis Villeneuve’s “Arrival”).
Several pioneering Montreal digital artists also participated in the project including the interactive music composer Philippe Lambert (Sundance’s landmark Way to Go VR by Vincent Morisset), fashion designer Ying Gao and 3D video artist Sabrina Ratté, who are all making their feature film debuts with V F C.
V F C is funded by the Canada Media Fund and SODEC. h264 will distribute the film in Canada with expected release in 2022. The project has participated at the Cannes NEXT Cinema & Transmedia Pitch, the Frontières Coproduction Market, and the Storytek Content+Tech Accelerator, among other international market development programs.