Virtual reality is a newer technology that was created to fulfill human curiosity about exploring beyond our own reality. In other words, virtual reality immerses the user in an artificial environment that mimics the real world. In a new project, virtual reality is being used to plunge a person into a Nazi-occupied Europe during World War II.
Anne was created by director Danny Abrahms, producer Jonah Hirsch, and CGO Studios. The film will give HMD-wearers a chance to visit Amsterdam’s “Secret Annex.” This is the location where Anne Frank famously hid with her family and a few other Jewish people from 1942–1944 while trying to avoid Nazi persecution. Anne is intended to be a more experiential visit than a visit to the Anne Frank museum, which was built on the Secret Annex. People will be able to have a similar experience to Anne as she and her family hid from the Nazis.
Ann Frank is an icon. Her famous diary has been a bestseller. Millions of people have read it. Many schoolchildren are set the extracts from the diary as part of their learning. Ann’s Dairy has helped the world to understand the evil of the Nazis and their brutal policies. All agree that the world should never forget the horrors of the Nazis and this installation will help future generations to remember and honor the victims of Nazi terror.
Abrahms reported to Entertainment Weekly, “To experience this film will be to immerse oneself in to a place and time, to move about a room, amongst the people, and sense the moment in a way never possible before [virtual reality].”
This is not Hirsch’s first experience in recreating historical moments through virtual reality. In 2015, he produced First, which allows people to take a trip back to Kitty Hawk, North Carolina in 1903, where Orville and Wilbur Wright (sibling inventors) flew in the sky with the first plane in the world.
Virtual reality as an exciting new technoogy will help to retain people’s interest in Anne Frank’s life and work. It will also encourage people to return to visit the Anne Frank Museum and maybe even read or read the book.
No official word has been released yet of when Anne will be available to the public. There is also no confirmation on which virtual reality headset(s) it is coming to. Stay tuned.