Surveillance Canadian Style

Whoa Canada

Directed by Sean Devlin (2015)

Film Review

Whoa Canada is an expose of illegal Canadian intelligence activities presented in the humorous satirical style of the Yes Men documentaries. The films credits list the Yes Men and Michael Achbar (directed The Corporation and Manufacturing Consent) as executive producers.

The film follows the exploits of the founders of the ShitHarperDid.com website as they attempt to investigate the psychic Harper has hired (at taxpayer expense) as his hairstylist and makeup artist.

These adventures are interlaced with escapades in which they crash closed door meetings between Harper and other members of the Conservative government and their corporate clients and benefactors.

The filmmakers also provide brief factual interludes revealing the extent of the Communications Security Establishment’s (CSE) illegal surveillance activities against Harper’s political opponents, their notorious racial profiling, their infiltration (along with the Canadian police) of the Canadian Occupy movement and the country’s barbarous treatment of First Nations Canadians.

I was particularly intrigued to learn that Canadian telecommunications providers voluntarily turned over data on their subscribers to Canadian intelligence after the CSE paid them over $1.6 million for it ((unlike the US where the government compelled telecoms to turn it over).

When CSE security guards deny them access to the multibillion dollar CSE security complex, ShitHarperDid.com activists hire their own psychic to visualize activities taking place inside the building. Her findings are later confirmed by NSA documents leaked by Edward Snowden.