Pirate Cinema
Encyclopedia
Pirate Cinema is a do-it-yourself cinema. Recently Pirate Cinema has been associated with groups in Brazil
, Berlin
, Copenhagen
, Melbourne
and Helsinki
, where local Pirate Cinema groups are associated with the anti-copyright
movement and squatting
.
At its simplest Pirate Cinema involved the screening of a movie in front of an audience, for free. Some Pirate Cinema groups perceive their actions within a political context, by deliberately screening copyright
ed movies, or movies that document the current copyright
debate.
In connection with showing copyrighted movies the Pirate Cinema group in Helsinki
had confrontation with the local police.
Pirate Cinema groups are also active in Amsterdam
, Stockholm
, Paris
and London
.
networks and screening them in open weekly sessions on the whereabouts of the Federal University of Espírito Santo.
Most of the movies were exhibited by the film society long before they officially got into Brazilian movie theaters. Some of them, like Kill Bill
and Fahrenheit 911, were screened more than two months before their official release. They were subtitled in Brazilian Portuguese by the very members of Cine Falcatrua.
On June 2004, the University that hosted the project was prosecuted by a couple Brazilian film companies that held the rights to distribute these films in national territory. Nevertheless, the film society did not stop its activities.
On October 2009, the Growing Minds Project started "Cinema Pirata São Paulo", another initiative to encourage free screenings and the popularization of free culture in Brazil. They promote free screenings in many places, theatres, streets, parks, etc., promoting free culture and conscience on the Intellectual Property revolution.
. The group has explained its position in a statement from November 2006. In it the group says:
In 2008 the group was renamed Jesper Cinema Copenhagen for a shorter period as a statement relating to the Danish "The Jesper Bay"-campaign.
Pirate Cinema Copenhagen screens mainly copyrighted movies, but makes few exceptions when the movies are copyright-related (such as the Steal This Film
and Good Copy Bad Copy
documentaries)
Members of Pirate Cinema Berlin were interviewed, asked "How did it all start?" they answered:
"(Sebastian Lütgert) Conventional cinema is fucked up and useless...
(Jan Gerber) But we started off because one of the films we had hadn’t been distributed and we wanted to have it screened . Our strong opinions about copyright and restrictions on distributing digital data always surfaced in Pirate Cinema events, with their motto: »Free admission, cheap drinks, and bring a blank CD.«"
Segments of an interview with Sebastian Lütgert are featured in Steal This Film
(Two), reflecting on copyright, internet and culture.
The "archive" of Pirate Cinema Berlin is said to be growing steadily. Content is mostly obtained via different peer-to-peer
file-sharing networks. In late 2008, it contains over 3 TB of compressed, tagged, sorted and searchable video material.
a pirate cinema group of had been running successfully (although sporadically) since early 2010. Amongst other things they aim provide free entertainment, protest against copyright and censorship laws, and make use of abandoned & disused spaces screening films under freeway bridges, in abandoned buildings & squats, etc... They mostly screen independent or less known films that would not get showed at a mainstream cinema.
on organiser of the local Pirate Cinema has been arrested by police in connection with the screening of copyrighted movies. The organisers said that their aim is to show the discrepancy between laws and how people really act.
Antti Kotilainen, executive director of the Copyright Information and Anti-piracy Centre (CIAPC), stated "They say that they are anarchists, fighting against big movie moguls. Then the only recreation that they have is to show movies produced by the companies that they despise so much."
Professor Jukka Kemppinen, an expert on copyright legislation, states that Pirate Cinema is a deliberate provocation, but that, despite it being illegal, there is no point in making a big issue out of it. Kemppinen states "It is no more illegal than showing a legally rented DVD to residents of an apartment building after an afternoon of volunteer work."
Brazil
Brazil , officially the Federative Republic of Brazil , is the largest country in South America. It is the world's fifth largest country, both by geographical area and by population with over 192 million people...
, Berlin
Berlin
Berlin is the capital city of Germany and is one of the 16 states of Germany. With a population of 3.45 million people, Berlin is Germany's largest city. It is the second most populous city proper and the seventh most populous urban area in the European Union...
, Copenhagen
Copenhagen
Copenhagen is the capital and largest city of Denmark, with an urban population of 1,199,224 and a metropolitan population of 1,930,260 . With the completion of the transnational Øresund Bridge in 2000, Copenhagen has become the centre of the increasingly integrating Øresund Region...
, Melbourne
Melbourne
Melbourne is the capital and most populous city in the state of Victoria, and the second most populous city in Australia. The Melbourne City Centre is the hub of the greater metropolitan area and the Census statistical division—of which "Melbourne" is the common name. As of June 2009, the greater...
and Helsinki
Helsinki
Helsinki is the capital and largest city in Finland. It is in the region of Uusimaa, located in southern Finland, on the shore of the Gulf of Finland, an arm of the Baltic Sea. The population of the city of Helsinki is , making it by far the most populous municipality in Finland. Helsinki is...
, where local Pirate Cinema groups are associated with the anti-copyright
Anti-copyright
Anti-copyright refers to the complete or partial opposition to prevalent copyright laws. Copyright is known as the owner's right for copies to be only made by the owner or with his/her authorization in form of a license....
movement and squatting
Squatting
Squatting consists of occupying an abandoned or unoccupied space or building, usually residential, that the squatter does not own, rent or otherwise have permission to use....
.
At its simplest Pirate Cinema involved the screening of a movie in front of an audience, for free. Some Pirate Cinema groups perceive their actions within a political context, by deliberately screening copyright
Copyright
Copyright is a legal concept, enacted by most governments, giving the creator of an original work exclusive rights to it, usually for a limited time...
ed movies, or movies that document the current copyright
Copyright
Copyright is a legal concept, enacted by most governments, giving the creator of an original work exclusive rights to it, usually for a limited time...
debate.
In connection with showing copyrighted movies the Pirate Cinema group in Helsinki
Helsinki
Helsinki is the capital and largest city in Finland. It is in the region of Uusimaa, located in southern Finland, on the shore of the Gulf of Finland, an arm of the Baltic Sea. The population of the city of Helsinki is , making it by far the most populous municipality in Finland. Helsinki is...
had confrontation with the local police.
Pirate Cinema groups are also active in Amsterdam
Amsterdam
Amsterdam is the largest city and the capital of the Netherlands. The current position of Amsterdam as capital city of the Kingdom of the Netherlands is governed by the constitution of August 24, 1815 and its successors. Amsterdam has a population of 783,364 within city limits, an urban population...
, Stockholm
Stockholm
Stockholm is the capital and the largest city of Sweden and constitutes the most populated urban area in Scandinavia. Stockholm is the most populous city in Sweden, with a population of 851,155 in the municipality , 1.37 million in the urban area , and around 2.1 million in the metropolitan area...
, Paris
Paris
Paris is the capital and largest city in France, situated on the river Seine, in northern France, at the heart of the Île-de-France region...
and London
London
London is the capital city of :England and the :United Kingdom, the largest metropolitan area in the United Kingdom, and the largest urban zone in the European Union by most measures. Located on the River Thames, London has been a major settlement for two millennia, its history going back to its...
.
Brazil
The first pirate cinema initiative in Brazil was Cine Falcatrua ("Cine Hoax"), an academic film society based on the state of Espírito Santo. Cine Falcatrua started its activities around 2003, downloading movies from P2PPeer-to-peer
Peer-to-peer computing or networking is a distributed application architecture that partitions tasks or workloads among peers. Peers are equally privileged, equipotent participants in the application...
networks and screening them in open weekly sessions on the whereabouts of the Federal University of Espírito Santo.
Most of the movies were exhibited by the film society long before they officially got into Brazilian movie theaters. Some of them, like Kill Bill
Kill Bill
Kill Bill Volume 1 is a 2003 action thriller film written and directed by Quentin Tarantino. It is the first of two volumes that were theatrically released several months apart, the second volume being Kill Bill Volume 2....
and Fahrenheit 911, were screened more than two months before their official release. They were subtitled in Brazilian Portuguese by the very members of Cine Falcatrua.
On June 2004, the University that hosted the project was prosecuted by a couple Brazilian film companies that held the rights to distribute these films in national territory. Nevertheless, the film society did not stop its activities.
On October 2009, the Growing Minds Project started "Cinema Pirata São Paulo", another initiative to encourage free screenings and the popularization of free culture in Brazil. They promote free screenings in many places, theatres, streets, parks, etc., promoting free culture and conscience on the Intellectual Property revolution.
Copenhagen
Pirate Cinema Copenhagen has since 2006 on a regular basis screened movies on different locations in CopenhagenCopenhagen
Copenhagen is the capital and largest city of Denmark, with an urban population of 1,199,224 and a metropolitan population of 1,930,260 . With the completion of the transnational Øresund Bridge in 2000, Copenhagen has become the centre of the increasingly integrating Øresund Region...
. The group has explained its position in a statement from November 2006. In it the group says:
"The battle of copyright is a battle for control. The film industry is fearing to lose control of which films we want to watch, how we want to watch them and how we produce new film. The technological evolution is giving access to a gigantic supply of film. Video technology is incorporated into cheap cameras and mobile phones. Now that we also can edit our own film on our computers, the film industry is scared - and they should be - of losing their monopoly on creating film culture."
In 2008 the group was renamed Jesper Cinema Copenhagen for a shorter period as a statement relating to the Danish "The Jesper Bay"-campaign.
Pirate Cinema Copenhagen screens mainly copyrighted movies, but makes few exceptions when the movies are copyright-related (such as the Steal This Film
Steal This Film
Steal This Film is a film series documenting the movement against intellectual property produced by The League of Noble Peers and released via the BitTorrent peer-to-peer protocol....
and Good Copy Bad Copy
Good Copy Bad Copy
Good Copy Bad Copy, A documentary about the current state of copyright and culture, is a documentary about copyright and culture in the context of Internet, peer-to-peer file sharing and other technological advances, directed by Andreas Johnsen, Ralf Christensen, and Henrik Moltke.It features...
documentaries)
Berlin
The group behind Pirate Cinema Berlin states in "Keep Up Your Rights. First Preliminary Program of the Berlin Pirate Cinema" that:Pirate Cinema Berlin regularly screens copyrighted and un-copyrighted movies.
"But above all, the “War on Piracy” is a war against revolution: against the French Revolution that has generalized individual rights and against the Digital Revolution that has generalized the individual exchange of data."
Members of Pirate Cinema Berlin were interviewed, asked "How did it all start?" they answered:
"(Sebastian Lütgert) Conventional cinema is fucked up and useless...
(Jan Gerber) But we started off because one of the films we had hadn’t been distributed and we wanted to have it screened . Our strong opinions about copyright and restrictions on distributing digital data always surfaced in Pirate Cinema events, with their motto: »Free admission, cheap drinks, and bring a blank CD.«"
Segments of an interview with Sebastian Lütgert are featured in Steal This Film
Steal This Film
Steal This Film is a film series documenting the movement against intellectual property produced by The League of Noble Peers and released via the BitTorrent peer-to-peer protocol....
(Two), reflecting on copyright, internet and culture.
The "archive" of Pirate Cinema Berlin is said to be growing steadily. Content is mostly obtained via different peer-to-peer
Peer-to-peer
Peer-to-peer computing or networking is a distributed application architecture that partitions tasks or workloads among peers. Peers are equally privileged, equipotent participants in the application...
file-sharing networks. In late 2008, it contains over 3 TB of compressed, tagged, sorted and searchable video material.
Melbourne
In MelbourneMelbourne
Melbourne is the capital and most populous city in the state of Victoria, and the second most populous city in Australia. The Melbourne City Centre is the hub of the greater metropolitan area and the Census statistical division—of which "Melbourne" is the common name. As of June 2009, the greater...
a pirate cinema group of had been running successfully (although sporadically) since early 2010. Amongst other things they aim provide free entertainment, protest against copyright and censorship laws, and make use of abandoned & disused spaces screening films under freeway bridges, in abandoned buildings & squats, etc... They mostly screen independent or less known films that would not get showed at a mainstream cinema.
Helsinki
In HelsinkiHelsinki
Helsinki is the capital and largest city in Finland. It is in the region of Uusimaa, located in southern Finland, on the shore of the Gulf of Finland, an arm of the Baltic Sea. The population of the city of Helsinki is , making it by far the most populous municipality in Finland. Helsinki is...
on organiser of the local Pirate Cinema has been arrested by police in connection with the screening of copyrighted movies. The organisers said that their aim is to show the discrepancy between laws and how people really act.
Antti Kotilainen, executive director of the Copyright Information and Anti-piracy Centre (CIAPC), stated "They say that they are anarchists, fighting against big movie moguls. Then the only recreation that they have is to show movies produced by the companies that they despise so much."
Professor Jukka Kemppinen, an expert on copyright legislation, states that Pirate Cinema is a deliberate provocation, but that, despite it being illegal, there is no point in making a big issue out of it. Kemppinen states "It is no more illegal than showing a legally rented DVD to residents of an apartment building after an afternoon of volunteer work."
See also
- The Pirate BayThe Pirate BayThe Pirate Bay is a Swedish website which hosts magnet links and .torrent files, which allow users to share electronic files, including multimedia, computer games and software via BitTorrent...
- Good Copy Bad CopyGood Copy Bad CopyGood Copy Bad Copy, A documentary about the current state of copyright and culture, is a documentary about copyright and culture in the context of Internet, peer-to-peer file sharing and other technological advances, directed by Andreas Johnsen, Ralf Christensen, and Henrik Moltke.It features...
- Steal This FilmSteal This FilmSteal This Film is a film series documenting the movement against intellectual property produced by The League of Noble Peers and released via the BitTorrent peer-to-peer protocol....
- CopyrightCopyrightCopyright is a legal concept, enacted by most governments, giving the creator of an original work exclusive rights to it, usually for a limited time...
- Anti-copyrightAnti-copyrightAnti-copyright refers to the complete or partial opposition to prevalent copyright laws. Copyright is known as the owner's right for copies to be only made by the owner or with his/her authorization in form of a license....