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Digital Innovation Conference held in 2016 – “What I consider the biggest problem in Syria today is the unconstrained bombing of civilians.”

FILM THREAT – ASK NO QUESTIONS Review

SLAMDANCE 2020 FILM FESTIVAL REVIEW! Wildly intriguing and entertaining, Jason Loftus and Eric Pedicelli’s speculative documentary Ask No Questions plays out like a real-life episode of Black Mirror. The filmmakers do ask questions, which they know have no definitive answers – and yet, as their investigation gradually unfurls, horrific implications are revealed: an alleged, meticulously-planned, violent scheme by a controlling government to destroy a spiritual group that it deemed threatening. A lot is packed into Ask No Questions brief running time, so keep up… Source: https://filmthreat.com/reviews/ask-no-questions/

DEADLINE – A Film Festival Screening In VR? ‘Ask No Questions’ Documentary Is Trying It, And Here’s How It Will Look

The filmmakers behind this year’s Slamdance documentary Ask No Questions saw their film’s festival run waylaid this spring by the industry’s coronavirus shutdown. Now they are teaming with San Francisco’s DocFest, where the pic was headed next, in an effort bring the fest screening experience to audiences in their homes. Source: https://deadline.com/2020/04/ask-no-questions-virtual-reality-film-festival-screening-1202911101/

Eric Pedicelli – Best Documentary Editing Nominee

Congratulations to our editor Eric Pedicelli of Chop Shop Media on his Canadian Screen Awards nomination for Black Code! #CdnScreenAwards Black Code is a Canadian documentary film, directed by Nicholas de Pencier and released in 2016.[1] Based on Ronald Deibert‘s book Black Code: Surveillance, Privacy, and the Dark Side of the Internet, the film explores the ways in which contemporary technology has facilitated an increasingly sophisticated surveillance infrastructure.[2] The film premiered at the 2016 Toronto International Film Festival.[3] The film received a Canadian Screen Award nomination for Best Editing in a Documentary (Eric Pedicelli) at the 6th Canadian Screen Awards in 2017.[4] Source: https://etcanada.com/news/196011/2017-canadian-screen-awards-nominees-revealed/

GLOBE AND MAIL – Black Code: A cautionary documentary on the surveillance state

They’re seductive, those modern conveniences that connect you to the world – your computer, your phone, your Facebook page – but they betray you at every moment, emitting what Ron Deibert calls “digital exhaust” which snooping governments and corporations can suck up and use to their advantage. Deibert, whose 2013 book Black Code: Inside the Battle for Cyberspace, was the basis of this film, is the director of the Citizen Lab at the University of Toronto, a crack team of roughly three dozen engineers, computer scientists, social scientists and others who track what they call “the exercise of political power in cyberspace.” Director Nicholas de Pencier, best known as the cinematographer on the gorgeous, sprawling docs of Jennifer Baichwal (Manufactured Landscapes, Watermark), follows Deibert as he tramps across the globe, dropping in on the Dr. Evil-ish HQ of the Swiss ISP which housed the original WikiLeaks server (situated in a former nuclear bunker, all granite and steel and gleaming glass) and meeting with exiled Tibetan monks, Syrian activists, Brazilian protesters and others crushed by the weight of the surveillance state. People often say they have nothing to fear from prying eyes because they have nothing to hide. Tell that to the Syrian man tortured for a month because of an ironic joke he made – privately, he’d thought – to a few friends on Facebook. Source: https://www.theglobeandmail.com/arts/film/film-reviews/black-code-a-cautionary-documentary-on-the-surveillance-state/article34704546/  

SF WEEKLY: The Roxie Theater Experiments with Virtual Reality Screening

It has been a little over a month since the Roxie Virtual Cinema opened on March 25, bringing the Roxie Theater’s curated programming to audiences online while the theater remains closed per the COVID-19 shelter-in-place order. While movies that otherwise would have played at the Roxie account for the bulk of Virtual Cinema, it is also a space that replicates — as best as it can — the entire indie theater experience. For example, in addition to taking in films, viewers are also invited to participate in Q&As. Source: https://www.sfweekly.com/film/the-roxie-theater-experiments-with-virtual-reality-screening/

SCREEN MAGAZINE – Explosive investigative doc, Slamdance Hit, ASK NO QUESTIONS

In turns disturbing, insightful, and moving, ASK NO QUESTIONS was described at its January Slamdance premiere as a real-life version of BLACK MIRROR. Directed by Jason Loftus and Eric Pedicelli, the documentary shows the dark side of the Chinese government and how they run a vicious propaganda campaign to discredit the spiritual practice of Falun Gong. A journalistic true-crime documentary, ASK NO QUESTIONS examines the captivating story of a Chinese state TV insider who is held and forced to accept the state line on a fiery public suicide he believes was a government plot. Evidence is credibly presented, shocking, and thorough, and the investigation leads into allegations of nefarious activity at a governmental scale. http://screenmag.com/story/2020/jul/29/12717/

DEADLINE – 1091 Nabs ‘Ask No Questions’ Docu – Film Briefs

1091 has acquired rights to Ask No Questions, a journalistic true-crime documentary from Lofty Sky Pictures as well as filmmakers Jason Loftus and Eric Pedicelli. It slated to be released across all digital platforms throughout North America beginning on June 30. The doc, which premiered at the year’s Slamdance, examines the captivating story of a Chinese state TV insider who is held and forced to accept the state line on a fiery public suicide he believes was a government plot… Source: https://deadline.com/2020/05/ren-stimpy-documentary-gravitas-talent-managers-erika-monroe-williams-sherry-kayne-moxie-artists-1091-ask-no-questions-docu-film-briefs-1202935853/

UNSEEN FILMS – Ask No Questions (2020) Slamdance 2020

ASK NO QUESTIONS is a look at China’s treatment of the Falun Gong movement which it supported for a while before it’s exponential growth scared the ruling party and the cracked down on it. The film focuses on the incident in Tiananmen Square where several members of Falun Gong set themselves on fire in protest. It was a moment that the Chinese government seized upon as means of showing how dangerous the group was… Source: http://www.unseenfilms.net/2020/01/ask-no-questions-2020-slamdance-2020.html