Deep Web, which was just picked up by EPIX at the SXSW film festival, has already received strong word of mouth. Directed by Alex Winter (Bill of Bill and Ted’s Excellent Adventure) and narrated by Keanu Reeves (his screen partner, Ted), the feature looks at the arrest of Ross William Ulbrecht, creator of online black market Silk Road and the implications of headline-making topics such as Bitcoin, the NSA’s vast reach and the so-called “deep web.” Company 3’s Bob Festa, known as a world-leading commercial colorist, was brought into the project by editor Dan Swietlik (Happy Valley, An Inconvenient Truth). “We’ve collaborated on short form work for upwards of 30 years,” says Festa. “And we had also worked on another feature, Re:Generation, which was one of the most enjoyable creative experiences of my professional life.”

Deep Web, he says, “was also very rewarding, but on a more intellectual level. The topics presented are so important and they’re presented in such a strong way. My work here was much more about drawing the viewer’s attention to all the information. There’s a lot of text and graphics and then interviews with very interesting people. It’s not the type of material where you want to leave color ‘footprints’ so to speak. My role is to subtly bring the important parts of the frame forward and push back anything that’s extraneous to the story.”