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Verax (film)

Verax
Directed by Jeff Floro, Edwin Lee, Shawn Tse, Marcus Tsui
Produced by Jeff Floro, Edwin Lee, Shawn Tse, Marcus Tsui
Written by Edwin Lee, Marcus Tsui
Starring Andrew Cromeek, Thomas Easterling, Gabe Ostley, Robert Hinson, Edwin Chin, Justin Lau, Cindy Wong, Simon Zeng Hao, Shi Yi Ng, Guo Aibing
Music by Gareth Coker, Thomas Vo
Cinematography Jeff Floro, Shawn Tse
Edited by Edwin Lee
Production
company
J.Shot Videos, Fallout Media, Immortal Peach
Distributed by YouTube
Release date
  • June 25, 2013 (2013-06-25)
Running time
5.5 minutes
Country Hong Kong
Language English, Cantonese, Mandarin
Budget HKD $5000

Verax is a five-minute 2013 short film about the Edward Snowden leaking event in Hong Kong. Produced by amateur filmmakers in Hong Kong, it was posted to YouTube in June 2013. The name of the film originates from Snowden's codename for himself, which means "truth teller" in Latin. It was produced by the group J.Shot Videos. According to the producers, this was the first film ever produced about Snowden.

The film has four parts. The first depicts Central Intelligence Agency employees discussing the Snowden case. The second involves a newspaper journalist corresponding with Snowden. The third involves Hong Kong police officers and Chinese Ministry of State Security employees discussing and trying to find Edward Snowden. The fourth involves the characters waiting for Snowden to appear, and when Snowden reveals himself in the media. The end of the film includes extracts of Snowden's interview with The Guardian. The final captions state that Snowden departed Hong Kong on 23 June. The film features The Mira, the Hong Kong hotel where Snowden stayed. A Rubik's cube, an item which, according to the Agence France-Presse, "Snowden reportedly used to identify himself to a Guardian journalist," is featured in the film. Marcus Tsui, one of the project's filmmakers, described the film as a "snapshot in time".

Andreas Wiseman of Screen Daily wrote that the plot uses "a large degree of creative licence".

The film was created by expatriates from Australia, Canada, Ireland, and the United States. The producers of the film were Jeff Floro, Edwin Lee, Shawn Tse, and Marcus Tsui. Lee, an Irish citizen, and the sole professional filmmaker involved, served as the editor and cinematographer. Lee had served as a journalist in the multimedia and television sectors and had worked for the South China Morning Post and ATV Home. On 11 July 2013, two days after Snowden revealed his identity, Edwin Lee had contacted his friends on the possibility of making a film. Lee and Tsui created the film's script, and did so one day before shooting. The actors had no time to rehearse their lines.


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