Potato Dreams

How do you tell the story of a Russian mother and son who fled their harsh existence in the Soviet Union to build a new life in the United States? You could use interviews, archive footage or reenactments, or you could do something completely new. Director Wes Hurley chose virtual reality. In the short documentary Potato Dreams, the mother and son discuss homophobia and Russian prisons, while we are free to explore the surrounding images. Turn around and you see four different tableaus, each with depictions of the prevailing melancholy, fear and pain. Or look up to discover that you're in a box that's being closed by a malevolent figure. There's a lot happening at once, which makes it hard to grasp the story, but it's precisely this chaos that Hurley wants to convey. As a final calm image fills the entire 360 degrees, we arrive at the peace that the mother and her son have been seeking for so long. 

This project is a 360-degree experience.