Rogers Media Original VICELAND Series RISE to Premiere at the 2017 Sundance Film Festival
TORONTO, Dec. 5, 2016 /CNW/ – Rogers Media announced today that its upcoming original VICELAND series, RISE, produced in partnership with VICE Studio Canada and APTN, will debut three episodes in the Short-Form Episodic Series in the Special Events category at the 2017 Sundance Film Festival. Additional broadcast details for RISE on VICELAND will be announced in the coming weeks.
“We are honoured to have RISE premiere at Sundance next year. There has never been a more urgent time to be telling these stories,” said Michelle Latimer, Algonquin/Métis filmmaker, RISE. “RISE is groundbreaking through its voicing of important issues around land, decolonization, and political governance told through an Indigenous point of view by showcasing the people who are leading this change globally.”
A condemnation of colonialism and a celebration of Indigenous people worldwide, RISE is a vibrant, gripping, and immersive documentary series that takes viewers to the frontlines of global Indigenous resistance. In two of the three episodes featured at Sundance, host Sarain Carson-Fox, of Anishinaabe lineage, will embark on a journey into Indigenous cultures to examine the social and political factors that threaten their liberation in the 21st century.
Along with an extended Q&A featuring Latimer, episodes to be screened at Sundance include: “Sacred Water,” focusing on the Standing Rock Sioux Reservation where the largest gathering of Indigenous people in more than a century have come together to protect their water from the “black snake” of the Dakota Access Pipeline; “Apache Stronghold,” focusing on Arizona’s San Carlos Apache tribe and their stand to protect the sacred lands of Oak Flat; and “Red Power,” focusing on the evolution of the Red Power Movement. Using today’s unprecedented occupation at Standing Rock as a jumping off point, “Red Power” follows land protectors and warriors to chart the evolution of the Indigenous Resistance Movement from past to present.
“We are extremely proud to be providing a platform for Indigenous stories to be told to audiences both in Canada and around the world,” said Colette Watson, Senior Vice President, TV and Broadcast Operations, Rogers Media. “To be included in the Sundance Film Festival is a testament to the heart and hard work that has gone into creating this series and will only serve to bring further awareness to this important narrative.”
The Sundance Film Festival takes place from January 19 to 29, with screenings in Park City, Salt Lake City, and at Sundance Mountain Resort, Utah. For the first time this year, Sundance is focusing its programming efforts to drive attention and action around a specific theme: climate change and environmental preservation. The Sundance Film Festival has introduced global audiences to some of the most groundbreaking films of the past three decades, including Boyhood, Beasts of the Southern Wild, Fruitvale Station, Whiplash, The End of the Tour, Little Miss Sunshine, Reservoir Dogs, An Inconvenient Truth, Frozen River, Precious, and Napoleon Dynamite.
For program information and images: RogersMediaTV.ca
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About Rogers Media
Rogers Media Inc., a division of Rogers Communications (TSX: RCI; NYSE: RCI), is a diversified leading Canadian media company that engages in television and radio broadcasting, publishing, digital, and sports entertainment. Rogers Broadcasting has 51 AM and FM radio stations across Canada; television properties include seven City stations, four OMNI multicultural television stations, Sportsnet (consisting of four regional channels and the nationally-distributed Sportsnet ONE, Sportsnet World, and Sportsnet 360), and The Shopping Channel, a televised and internet shopping service. Rogers Media’s suite of digital assets includes 90+ owned and 300+ premium partnership sites. Rogers Media Inc. owns Rogers Centre stadium, a year-round sports and entertainment facility, and the Toronto Blue Jays Baseball Club.
About VICE Canada
VICE Canada is a leader in producing and distributing high quality youth content to a Canadian audience, in both official languages, reaching millions of Canadians a month. VICE’s original, multifaceted and often provocative content is available across multiple platforms including, ten award-winning digital verticals, mobile apps, linear television, print and a suite of record-breaking YouTube channels. Since entering into a joint venture with Rogers Media in 2014, VICE Canada has been aggressively expanding, launching a state of the art production studio in Toronto, Daily VICE – a daily mobile news show and VICELAND – VICE Media’s first television channel. VICE Canada has received numerous awards for its content including Canadian Screen Awards, The Webby’s and Quebec’s Gemeaux’s.
About VICELAND
Most TV channels are just a collection of shows – VICELAND is a collection of personal points-of-view. Everything at VICELAND has a reason to exist and a strong perspective. Our mission is to examine the world we live in, and explore the things that confuse us, make us curious, make us laugh, or awaken our sense of wonder. VICELAND features series examining all things culture, including music, food, technology, sex, fashion and more. The channel is overseen by Oscar-winning writer/director Spike Jonze, a long-time VICE partner and creative director for the company, and features series hosted by VICE newcomers like Ellen Page, Ian Daniel, Michael K Williams and Hailey Gates, as well as longtime VICE hosts like Action Bronson, Thomas Morton and Eddie Huang.
SOURCE Rogers Media
Image with caption: “Image from RISE episode, “Sacred Water”. Credit: VICE Canada (CNW Group/Rogers Media)”. Image available at: http://photos.newswire.ca/images/download/20161205_C1102_PHOTO_EN_831723.jpg
