There’s one more film opening this week that it would be remiss of me to leave out, and that’s this confronting, international documentary. The Act of Killing is a documentary centered on a collection of Indonesian paramilitary fighters that fought in death squads in the 1960s, participating in the torturing and murder of more than a million people — Communists, intellectuals and ethnic Chinese.
Since they’ve been treated as heroes of a sort and never punished for their deeds, they’re unrepentant, even proud: they discuss their histories with the filmmakers, even going so far to re-enact some of them in Hollywood style.
I haven’t seen the film myself yet, but I’ve heard wildly diverging opinions from friends: a couple of people have told me it was the most powerful thing they saw at the Sydney Film Festival earlier this year, and a must-watch.
Others have said that it’s sickening and exploitative, particularly given that it’s been made by Western documentarians and focused so tightly on Anwar Congo and his followers without equivalent time for the families of their victims.
Either way, it’s an important piece of our region’s history, and it’s worth finding out for yourself where you stand, if you think you can handle the subject matter.
Madman are bringing it to cinemas in Sydney and Melbourne from October 3, and their page for the film has more details.
Here’s a trailer:
http://youtu.be/9_NnW4p5fs0