Do Not Circulate
16m
Directed by Tiffany Sia • Documentary • 2021 • 17 minutes
Do Not Circulate, an experimental short film directed by Tiffany Sia, attempts a structuralist and materialist approach to unraveling the entrails of a collective media memory. Paced by an essay as a relentless voiceover, the film rips footage that challenges the materiality, ownership and legal boundaries of documentation. This film contains footage, descriptions and acts that may constitute criminal offenses under prevailing laws. The following offense-related material is meant for documentary purposes only. All rights reserved to respective copyright owners. The archival footage spans a single news event in Hong Kong, weaving a violent timeline in roughly the order that the materials were published online, including anonymously uploaded videos from Twitter and internet forums, allegedly leaked audio and news reportage––much of which has since been erased, disavowed or forgotten. A digital media trail teeters between the seeable and unseeable, deception and truth, conjuring ghosts and occult forces on the timeline.