Missing Pictures: Birds of Prey

In this first episode of a series of VR documentaries on never-completed film projects by famous directors, Abel Ferrara (King of New York; Bad Lieutenant) discusses Birds of Prey, his project from 1980. The script by Nicholas St. John concerns a revolutionary uprising in a dystopian New York ruled over by a dictatorial company.

The VR places the user in the midst of this sinister city alongside the director himself, who was filmed volumetrically. This allows Ferrara to appear in his own film and talk about why it was never made. We see him seated on a discarded couch in an alleyway at night, watching the police commit brutal acts of violence; leaning against a fire escape amid the firebombs unleashed by the revolutionaries; and on a roof, gloomily reviewing the reconstructed future vision from 1980—one in which the Twin Towers are still standing. Animations based on rough sketches from the pre-production process bring to life the planned scenes he describes.