9 euro | SPRING 2020 MODERN TIMES REVIEW THE EUROPEAN DOCUMENTARY MAGAZINE CPH:DOX THESSALONIKI DF ONE WORLD CINÉMA DU RÉEL Copenhagen, Denmark Thessaloniki, Greece Prague, Czech Paris, France Intellectually stimulating and emotionally engaging? [page 10–11] THE PAINTER AND THE THIEF THE PAINTER HUMAN IDFF MAJORDOCS BOOKS PHOTOGRAPHY Oslo, Norway Palma, Mallorca New Big Tech, New Left Cinema The Self Portrait; Dear Mr. Picasso Animation! [page 8–9] 772535 293004 THE TOWER 9> Playing in the online dark In its more halcyon early days, nature of these interactions. ABUSE: In a radical the internet was welcomed Still, the messages and shared psychosocial experiment, into households for its utopi- (albeit blurred for us) images an possibilities. A constantly are highly disturbing, the bra- the scope of online updating trove of searchable zenness and sheer volume of child abuse in the Czech information made bound en- the approaches enough to sha- Republic is uncovered. cyclopaedia sets all but obso- ke anyone’s trust in basic hu- lete; email and social media manity to the core («potential- BY CARMEN GRAY promised to connect citizens ly triggering» is a word applied of the world, no longer seg- to films liberally these days, Caught in the Net mented into tribes by physical but if any film warrants it, it is distance, in greater cultural un- surely this one). Director Vit Klusák, Barbora derstanding. The make-up artist recog- Chalupová In the rush of enthusiasm, nises one of the men and is Czech Republic, Slovakia the old truth was suspended, chilled to witness this behav- that tools are only as enlight- iour from someone she knows, ened as their users. Darker especially as he works in chil- recesses of networked life, it dren’s camps. The counter- has since emerged, are mani- point of one kindly young man fold. The purportedly benign ra Chalupová, which screens following a strict code of con- who offers encouragement of but aggressively vocal form at CPH:DOX in Copenhagen, duct whereby predators must a non-sexual nature is the ex- of public peer surveillance confronts the most egregious always initiate their crimes, the ception that proves the rule; a that is social media has flat- abuses of online connectivity. women, who repeatedly state decent anomaly in a sea of per- tened the complexity of hu- Labeled a «psychosocial expe- they are twelve, interact with verse threat. man interactions, and the riment,» it is stomach-churning men (whose faces are blurred) One wonders about the im- private, once inaccessible to in its unflinching revelations, who push them to watch and pact on the actresses. The strangers, can feel less cor- as it reveals the mind-boggling engage in sexually explic- imposed regression back to doned off. Anyone can «slide scale and nature of online child it acts. Some men blackmail childhood, as they dress up into your DMs» with the sexual abuse in the Czech Re- them, threatening to publish as twelve-year-olds and bring brashness of near-anonymity, public. Three nineteen-year-old images of them online or to out personal effects to their stu- hiding behind a screen. Soci- female actresses were hired to their behaviour to parents and dio rooms (from sheet music ety’s dubious, even malevo- pretend to be twelve-year-olds teachers. Over the ten days to a dollhouse) to take them lent elements can seek each and set up with fake online pro- of the experiment, 2,458 men back to the age, is queasy to other out more efficiently, files and children’s bedrooms contacted the three actresses, watch, even before they are unchecked and unseen, and built in a studio, in order to and they attended 21 secretly subjected to explicit preda- build sub-communities; they fool predators. monitored person- tory attention. Enraged, one can also find direct routes to The opening sta- al meetings with throws a drink in the face the vulnerable, amid a deluge tistics alone are stag- They dress up them in the weeks of her blackmailer in a cafe of virtual, unregulated traffic. gering. Well over half as twelve-year- that followed, meet-up, unable to contain of Czech children olds and bring as the predators her disgust at the exploita- Egregious abuses. Czech do- spend time online personal effects to sought to take the tion she has experienced. She cumentarian Vit Klusák tou- alone with no paren- their studio rooms. relationships of- later says she’s now suffering ched on the way in which the tal limits, and 41% fline. All informa- from nightmares. But wheth- internet can be harnessed by have received por- tion was shared er or not the project could, in less edifying personalities in nographic images from another with the Czech police, with some ways, feed into and off his previous documentary, The person. Of the 23 women who criminal proceedings initiated. of covert online horror, its de- White World According to Dali- attend the casting call, 19 say monstrable positive impacts borek. It portrayed the daily they experienced some form Triggering. Psychologists, sexo- – raising public awareness life of a hapless, middle-aged of online abuse in childhood. logists, lawyers, and criminal about a pervasive and little neo-Nazi, living in smalltown Service providers, fearing a investigators are visibly on understood societal danger, Moravia with his chain-smo- loss in ad revenue, do little to hand at all stages in what is a and exposing and reporting king mother. Resentful after block illegal communication. project obviously fraught with numerous perpetrators, posi- she finds a boyfriend through As soon as the team activates ethical complexities and po- tions its makers with robust an online dating site, he falls the women’s fake profiles tential controversy. As specta- arguments that it’s on the side deeper into nationalism as a (on sites including Facebook, tors, we often view the wider of the public good. bedroom hobbyist, making Skype, Lide.cz, Snapchat, and set as a whole, observing the and posting bigoted songs and Omegle), they are bombarded production team, as well as Plays at CPH:DOX in videos to YouTube. Klusák’s with friend requests from adult the actresses, at their laptops Copenhagen and other festivals. latest feature Caught in the strangers. so that we can never lose sight Net, co-directed with Barbo- Coached on what to say and of the constructed, performed [email protected] 2 MODERN TIMES REVIEW | N# 7 SPRING 2020 MODERN TIMES REVIEW THE INTERNATIONAL men of Kadyrov in Chechnya, DOCUMENTARY polluted and toxic environment, MAGAZINE Docs qualitative or artificial needs, tormented souls, ecological Editor-in-chief: imprint, beauty in pain, regimes Truls Lie of despots, colonization, image [email protected] and de- overflow, urban escape, Putin and his cronies, risking lives, Communication manager: futurism, indigenous people, Steve Rickinson powering surveillance mentality, lost [email protected] children, anorexia, etc. Translators/proofreading: FESTIVALS: Can docu- Destitution. We are living in POPULISM. ©BERTRAMS JOEP (NETHERLAND), SEE WWW .LIBEX.EU JOEP (NETHERLAND), POPULISM. ©BERTRAMS Tristen Bakker, Anders mentaries be a part of the ongoing metaphysics of Dunker, Steve Rickinson have become more and more social-liberal or eco-anarchistic the western military-industrial de-powering – «desti- ridden by populism and easily worldview? Maybe. complex, with consumerism Subscription: 9 euro/quarter tution» – most needed digested trivial articles blurred As you can see in several and competition as ongoing (3–4 print issues + weekly in today’s power-driven by the streams of social media. articles in our issues, we care aims. A race to the bottom online) Luckily, a lot of doc directors about modern times, about the exploiting the planet – also e-mail: subscription@modern- societies? have taken on the role of inves- coming decades of big tech with nations against nations times.review BY TRULS LIE tigative journalists with years (page 32), futurism/hyperintel- (or refugees), company against www.moderntimes.review/ of work voluntarily invested ligence (page 43), and artificial company, person against account/subscription You are now one – combined with visual style. intelligence (page 16–17). person … of the around One great example is Caught in We also care about the «eco- Maybe we should listen Print: Nr1Trykk/Amedia, 20 000 people the Net (page 2) which shows a grief», expressed by Extinction more to the new movements Lillestrøm, Norway who will have social media setup, where 2500 Rebellion (page 14–15). Our of «destitution», a way of being this European sexually single-minded men «minority» care about where we that makes the powers that be Publisher: documentary quickly showed up at screens humans are going, and what our lose their grip on you. A kind of Film AS magazine in to chat with who they think legacy will be. Life is short – as de-powering – and not repow- their hands. Our independent are 12-year old vulnerable girls we know. ering to the same. Why not a Post Office address: journalism is written by more – apparently curious to talk to de-powering of «enemy images» Dronningensgt 16 than ten regular doc critics someone through social media. Festivals. The hundreds of sold by governments, the mass 0152 Oslo, Norway from all over Europe. Modern Statistics shows that there are festival docs this spring gives media and the fiction film -in Organisation number: Times Review (MTR) is now in many young girls out there us a lot of stories and visuals dustry? 997460103 MVA its fourth year, planning to be chatting, who can be exposed to to reflect on. But how do we in- Are we the minority of a quarterly magazine. And we this – as the film tells. The four terpret reality? As humans we open-minded, accepting, and Modern Times Review has are doing podcasts – so maybe paid female actors are actually have «dispo- living with the Other – the per- received support from the you will meet me around with 19 years old – and we also see tifs» as Michel son with a different religion, Norwegian Foundation of a microphone … (See also our them meet some of these men We are Foucault once different skin, different values? Free Expression.