TPB AFK: The Pirate Bay Away From Keyboard

Special Events, North American premiere
D: Simon Klose

With VOD and digital downloads so ubiquitous, it’s almost impossible to remember that only four years ago, the Internet was the film industry’s bane, and the Pirate Bay filesharing site its great demon. Klose’s film is less a documentary and more a third-person video diary of the 2009 trial of the site’s four main managers and their journey through the oddly relaxed Swedish legal system. Klose’s deliberately flat narrative tone – interspersed with lyrical shots of servers and cables – leaves it unclear how much he endorses them and their increasingly straw-man fight against the creative industry. However, possibly inadvertently, he takes a portrait of the worst side of the IT industry – misogynistic, arrogant, and prone to confusing “can be done” with “should be done.” Klose has already put the whole film on YouTube. That’s his choice. The Pirate Bay defendants never gave thousands of filmmakers, big and small, studio and indie, the same luxury.

Thursday, March 14, 11:30am, Vimeo

This article appears in March 15 • 2013.

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The Chronicle's first Culture Desk editor, Richard has reported on Austin's growing film production and appreciation scene for over a decade. A graduate of the universities of York, Stirling, and UT-Austin, a Rotten Tomatoes certified critic, and eight-time Best of Austin winner, he's currently at work on two books and a play.