Chakra-Vyooh
Chakra-Vyooh is directed by Gaurie Bonsley and is about an everyday person who is forced to live out a seemingly ordinary day over and over again by an unseen force. He seems content to live out the life of a business professional but there is something inside of him that yearns for more. This force causes him to take an introspective look at himself and challenges the “robotic” day to day routine that he calls he calls his life. Will Ryan be able to escape his mundane life, trapped by the Chakra-Vyooh for the rest of his life? Or will Ryan fall to the challenge, forever sealing his destiny? This suspense thriller serves as an allegory for anyone who feels trapped in their own personal life, and with a sci-fi twist, makes it a very fun and unique watch for anyone watching.
What Gaurie Bonsley is able to do with this film is create a lot of visual references that serve multiple meanings. While you are watching a film about someone living a “robotic life” you are also seeing filters and effects that help to enhance that point by making the scene look as if it’s through the perspective of a robot. There are many other examples of this shown throughout the short and are all done well by the director. The main character Ryan is shown as someone who feels like he’d just been unplugged from the matrix. The life he’s leading is very bland, and formulaic and he is completely unaware of this until he realizes that he’s trapped. I enjoyed how they set up his character at the beginning of the film and how they showed his realization of being trapped through the camerawork and visual effects.
The film takes risks in how it shows Ryan trapped. The tv inside Ryan’s room serves as a way to show the audience not only what’s going on inside Ryan’s head, but also with how they combined one scene inside of said tv, while the other scene was frozen in place. It was very interesting to watch mostly on how unique the concept is. The cinematography is good as well as the camerawork. There are some very well put together shots towards the end and the film, both in how they were framed and edited with visual effects. The room Ryan stays in during the parts where he’s under the influence of the Chakra-Vyooh is very muggy, and sinister. With dark smoke surrounding him and the tv frozen on static, it looked very good and added a lot to the fear of the Chakra-Vyooh.
The editing and pacing of the short never seem to waver, and neither did my enjoyment of this short. Chakra-Vyooh is an interesting and unique look into the working world of today, but with a sci-fi twist. It explores themes like what it means to be free, how we work in a society, and what you can lose when you become a cog in the machine. I would recommend to anyone who likes introspective films with a sci-fi twist.
