The Stone, a virtual-reality experiment

The Stone, the first VR documentary short directed by Juan Carlos Rulfo, screened in the Ópera Orbis special section at the Guanajuato International Film Festival (GIFF) last July, alongside works by directors Roberto Fiesco and Carlos Hagerman.

It was GIFF that directly invited Juan Carlos to make the short. “I didn't think about it long. I've always been interested in playing with technology and with new formats and languages to tell stories.”

In this case, it's the search for an iconic place where his father, Juan Rulfo, once stood. A rock at the Nevado de Toluca where he took a self-portrait — a selfie, as we'd say today. “In that search, fantastic things happen. Maybe I'll never find the rock, but all the signals that occur there, the signals meant to distract the viewer — more than finding the rock we become aware of what is happening in the space,” the director explains to Código Espagueti magazine.

Making the short was a technological and creative challenge, because it uses 360-degree cameras, a novelty for Juan Carlos, which require adjustments not only in the cinematography but in the very way the story is told.

“You can decide whether to watch what I want to tell you or whether to go off on your own. I'll play with you, try to distract you so you follow me, but if you go your own way you may discover what I am looking for before I do,” Juan Carlos explains.

After this first experience, Juan Carlos Rulfo is enthusiastic about making more projects of this kind in the future. “This is just beginning and I think it has many possibilities,” he says.