Synopsis
Is piracy organized crime or class struggle? Are alternative artists who want to hold rights over their art and go it alone in the market, visionaries or nutcases? Is the fine line between plagiarism and inspiration a cop-out or a whole other way of looking at the fluid nature of authorship? When more than three fourths of those with an internet connection download all sorts of material for free, are they living out a brand new cultural freedom – or are they criminals? Full of wicked irony, great music and thorny questions Partners in Crime explores the grey horizons of copyright and culture in times when technology is changing the contours of the market.

Program Note
Should we consider the act of illegal copying and downloading of cultural contents a crime? Or is it part of class struggle against the distribution structures of media conglomerates as a way of further circulating arts? Paromita VOHRA’s Partners in Crime deals with copyright issues and questions about piracy that we cannot easily answer. After taking the audiences through a number of interviews with a collector of movie files who is completely unaware that downloading torrent files is illegal, businessmen from music and film industries who are unhappy with piracy, veteran salesmen profiting from pirate markets, and artists who find it difficult to make money within the legal distribution structure although they are adverse to piracy, the film ends with an interview with Metal Heads, a socialist activist band using piracy and illegal distribution as weapons against capitalism. Listening to their voices, however, does not conclude the film. Partners in Crime brings the audiences deeper into the issues about copyrights by adding yet another link to the chain of unresolved ironies. [HWANG Miyojo]