By: tune

I just finished watching the act of killing (available on netflix). The film was nominated for Oscar this year and won numerous awards the past 2 years. In the words of the director, “My first feeling, as somebody who lost a lot of family in the Holocaust, was that it was as if I had walked into Germany and the Nazis had won and former SS officers were discussing the deaths of the Jews as if it was something fantastic…” (http://cinema-scope.com/cinema-scope-magazine/24-find-me-guilty-joshua-oppenheimers-the-act-of-killing/) As I watched painfully scene after scene on how the story evolved over the 8 years time period it took to finish this movie project, I was reminded by this blog post of yours Jen. It described what you just wrote up there, “Now I see that, frighteningly, there is no ontological difference between me and the smiling employees in that Auschwitz photo; the difference is nothing more or less than the stories we tell ourselves about what was going on in the background.” I can write more, but seriously, just watch the movie! As Indonesian, I can say that it depicted the story and the condition of the Indonesian society (where the so-called “free man” rules) really well. It also oversimplifies a few things, as my friend wrote here: http://history-indonesia.blogspot.com/2012/12/image-from-act-of-killing-taken-during.html.