Alejandro Inarritu Is Doing VR, Will Turn Us All into Revenants

Alejandro González Iñárritu has forever been one step ahead of the curve, always keen to try out new and different ways of filmmaking, and he’s not stopping now. His latest project sees him teaming up with the frequent collaborator and cinematographer Emmanuel Lubezki (The Revenant, Birdman) as they delve into film’s final frontier: virtual reality.

Iñárritu and Lubezki’s VR short film will follow the experience of a group of refugees as they cross the border from Mexico into the United States. The two are joining forces with Legendary, which is producing the project, and Lucasfilm’s newly minted ILMxLAB, which will help build the virtual world and the characters. According to The Hollywood Reporter, the short has been in development for about four years, so it sounds like Iñárritu was just waiting for the world’s technology to catch up with his ideas.

No news about casting or filming has been released yet, so we have no idea what exactly this project will look like or how long it’ll take to make. Iñárritu isn’t the only director trying VR on for size: both Ridley Scott and Steven Spielberg have projects in the works, and it’s only a matter of time before more directors start experimenting with the medium. Who knows, maybe in a couple of years stuff with screens will be obsolete, and we’ll all be sitting in dark rooms with goggles strapped to our heads, reaching out into thin air and grabbing at nothing as we’re being chased through the woods by angry bears.