The Missing Picture (2013) User Reviews

A testament of unbounded courage

[howard.schumann · 8/10 · 8 November 2013]

Philosopher Albert Camus said, "Good intentions may do as much harm as malevolence if they lack understanding." Indeed, we have seen many examples in history of how ideology, no matter how well intentioned, can lead to disastrous consequences if not tempered with compassion and respect for the rights of the individual. We saw it in Nazi Germany and in the Soviet Union during the Stalin era. There is no more blatant example of the distorted use of ideology than in the 1975 takeover of Cambodia (renamed as the Democratic Republic of Kampuchea) by the Khmer Rouge under the leadership of Pol Pot (aka Saloth Sar).

While the goal of the Khmer Rouge was to promote an agrarian socialist economy and eradicate any remaining traces of individuality, their process of forced labor and communal living led to the death of millions of people and when they fled in 1979, they left behind a trail of tears. Only thirteen-years-old at the time, Director Rithy Panh, lost his entire family in Cambodia during those years and has documented his experience in The Missing Picture, winner of the Un Certain Regard award at the 2013 Cannes Film Festival. It is a deeply moving film that uses hand-carved clay figures sculpted by Sarith Mang together with archival news footage and propaganda films used by the Khmer Rouge to paint an overwhelming picture of man's inhumanity to man.

Although the sadness etched on the faces of the painted clay figures moving on doll-house sets are somewhat distancing and can only give us a vague idea of the amount of suffering that took place, Panh's affectingly poetic voice-over helps us to bridge that gap by offering the perspective of one who lived through those years. In their four years in control of Cambodia, the Khmer Rouge destroyed food sources outside of centralized control, forbade fishing and the planting of mountain rice, abolished medicine and hospitals, and refused offers of humanitarian aid. Now 50, Panh says that making the film has helped him to come to terms with his memories, reflecting that, "in the middle of life, childhood returns—sweet and bitter." While the film's historical perspective is limited, it gives us a sense of the vibrant life of Phnom Penh before the Khmer Rouge arrived to evacuate the city, uprooting and exiling millions of families to re-educate them in labor camps. Those not needed were told, "To keep you is no benefit, to destroy you is no loss." Those forced to leave were told that the evacuation was meant to protect them from American bombs and they would be able to return to their homes in a few days. Panh refers to the U.S. bombing of Cambodia during the Vietnam War as a factor that persuaded Cambodians to look for an alternative to their current political system but he does not attempt in any way to justify the actions of Pol Pot.

The Missing Picture, while grim and perhaps repetitive, is a powerful prayer that no child ever has to again witness what Panh saw: his family forced from a home filled with music and literature, his father going on a hunger strike and dying from starvation and illness; the execution of children who were forced to denounce their parents; sitting on the cold ground night after night watching propaganda films displaying happy faces while outside thousands starved. Under the leadership of Pol Pot, an estimated 2.2 million people died from execution, illness, or starvation, a tragedy that left a legacy of suffering that continues until the present day. Miraculously, Panh survived to tell his story and in The Missing Picture, has left us a testament of unbounded courage.

Fabulous Documentary. Ranks among 2013's best.

[aaskillz69 · 8/10 · 25 September 2014]

"It's not a picture of loved ones i seek, i want to touch them, their voices are missing, so i wont tell. I want to leave it all, leave my language, my country in vain and my childhood returns. Now it's the boy who seeks me out, i see him, he wants to speak to me but words are hard to find." -Randal Douc

I think i first heard of The Missing Picture more than a year ago when it premiered at Cannes and got out of there with the Un Certain Regard Award. The early buzz was good but the film did not stay with me and it was quickly forgotten until it's name came as a surprise in Academy Award Nominations that gave the film a nomination at the Best Foreign Picture. Then i check out the film again and realized that it had gotten great reviews overall and the film entered my watchlist but only seven months after that event was able actually able to see it. I was now still curious but not exactly excited to see it.

The Missing Picture is Directed by Rithy Panh, "For many years, I have been looking for the missing picture: a photograph taken between 1975 and 1979 by the Khmer Rouge when they ruled over Cambodia. On its own, of course, an image cannot prove mass murder, but it gives us cause for thought, prompts us to meditate, to record History. I searched for it vainly in the archives, in old papers, in the country villages of Cambodia. Today I know: this image must be missing. I was not really looking for it; would it not be obscene and insignificant? So I created it. What I give you today is neither the picture nor the search for a unique image, but the picture of a quest: the quest that cinema allows."

As said i was interested but not exactly excited to finally see this, i felt like it was more of an obligation since it had received great praise and even an Academy Award Nomination. Well i got to say that i'm a foll because i was completely overwhelmed by this film, it's a shame that it have only seen it now and a shame that most people have not yet seen and are likely to never see this wonderful little movie.

It's funny because i had heard from the film for so long but i went in knowing absolutely nothing, i had no idea what it was about, i had heard that it was an unusual kind of documentary, but the film was not nominated for that category so i was a bit confused. The film is indeed a documentary that follows the life experience of a man who lived under the Khmer Rouge regime in Cambodia from 1975 to 1979. So after gaining independence and fighting the Vietnam War and a Civil War the Cambodian people went through a lot more they went through the Communist Regime, where the slogan are everyone is equal and those who complaint are enemies, where ignorance and hunger are kings. The Cambodian holocaust went through four years of enslavement and working fields that killed over 2.500.000. people. You probably didn't know that right? Me neither.

The film certainly as a moving, touchy subject but only having an important subject doesn't make a good documentary, it's direction sure is important and here the direction is certainly unorthodox and the results are nothing short of outstanding. Documentary does feature live action images of the working fields but most of the film's narrative and storytelling is done through clay figures. Yes clay figures are used to dramatize the horrifying images that the director as a child saw and experienced. The results, are nothing of amazing, this could have gone real goofy, or maybe it would have been impossible to us audience to make a connection with the story if it's being told by clay figures but non of that is true. Weirdly or not we are able to connect and relate to the clay figures and the film is able to be emotionally wrecking and have an enormous deal of power even if through those little pieces.

Never in a million years would i have thought that those little figures would have moved me in the way they did, they are quite disturbing too, the faces of the figures, very expressive at times it was like the fear, the hunger it became palpable, it's amazing. This is also due to the documentaries fantastic direction that reminded me of Hiroshima Mon Amour, it's poetic, breathtaking.

The Missing Picture is an amazingly underseen picture, last years best documentary(yes better than The Act of Killing) and by the way why was this not nominated for that category. Well continuing...if you have the chance see it and you won't be disappointed, it's emotionally shattering, it's unusual, innovative, poignant and overall an extremely well made documentary that is among last years best.

Rating: A-

This film could use a huge infusion of energy.

[planktonrules · 6/10 · 26 October 2015]

"The Missing Picture" is a very unusual documentary and was nominated for the Oscar for Best Foreign Language Film. It's so unusual because filmmaker Rithy Panh tells the story both with archival footage AND little figurines that he created for the film! Perhaps this was a way to make the horror of the Khmer Rouge easier for the audience to watch, as an hour and a half of footage of atrocities would be just about unwatchable considering how brutal this regime was. And, since you don't see live actors in the film-- just narration and film clips, seeing it in its original French language or the optional English language form is a roughly identical experience, or at least I assume so.

While I enjoyed how unique this film was and figure its uniqueness probably led to its Oscar nomination, I must confess that the narration made an exciting story very, very slow and a bit tedious. Perhaps the French language version is better, I don't know. All I know is that a film like "The Killing Fields" or a regular documentary about the subject is something I could have enjoyed or at least stuck with better.

Coloring in the omitted lines

[StevePulaski · 9/10 · 20 July 2014]

Cambodia's 2013 entry to the Best Foreign Film category of the 85th Academy Awards, The Missing Picture, concerns a dark topic of history you probably didn't learn about in your high school world history/global connections course. Or perhaps you did learn about it but it quickly escaped your mind, like many other pieces of information. It concerns the tragedy of the Khmer Rouge uprising in 1970's Cambodia, and such a tragedy has never been explored quite like it has been in this particular film.

A reading program I was forced to use my freshman year in high school hard an entire unit devoted to the Khmer Rouge and the events surrounding a time of unimaginable darkness for a country many, including myself, know tragically little about. I, admittedly, likely couldn't point to the country on a map. The unit was my personal favorite, as it talked about a journalist by the name of Dith Pran, who found himself victim to the merciless "Killing Fields" that the Khmer Rouge set up during this violent uprising. However, The Missing Picture documents a much more personal story than the highly-publicized Pran story, and instead, focuses on a filmmaker's tragic experience with the event in a style that is highly meditative and deeply fascinating.

It was April 17, 1975 that the Khmer Rouge, a communist regime, seized the capital of Cambodia, Phnom Penh. From that day forward, thirteen-year-old Rithy Panh would never be the same, with him, his parents, his relatives, neighbors, and villagers all being led into internment camps, stripped of their belongings and personal possession to be clothed in black cloaks and given a number that would serve as their identity. They endured this abusive and crippling hell for four years, many of them dying or being killed in the process.

Thirty-nine years later, Panh has found the courage and strength to create a surprisingly artful picture that literally paints vivid dioramas and ideas as to what endured under the Khmer Rouge regime, led by Pol Pot, an active member of the communist party. Panh employs the use of rare and haunting archival footage, providing the idea for life under Khmer Rouge better than present-day interviews ever could, but Panh's original technique comes in the form of impeccably detailed clay dioramas that provide us with an almost contradictory whimsy to such horrific events.

Panh also shows himself painstakingly constructing these unique little clay figures, even getting emotional as he constructs clay figures that represent his deceased parents. He paints them with the lovely imperfections of real humans in terms of color, but paints them with unfathomable accuracy in terms of facial structure and torso-build.

What is even more unfathomable is how Panh updates these figures little-by-little overtime, having their ribcages protrude out more, their facial features begin to wither, as well as showing their stomachs enlarge due to the horribly inadequate conditions the Khmer Rouge bestowed upon the communities, and this attention to detail, combined with the absolutely original and unique presentation qualities for a documentary make The Missing Picture a beautifully made film in the visual department.

If there's one detractor, it's Panh's narration, which can best be described as monotone and occasionally droning. When the subject matter fits, however, the voice can work to compliment what is going on in the film, but there are times when the film could use a bit more excitement or even identifiable emotion, especially when Panh begins to talk about the alternative routes, good and bad, that could've also happened to Cambodia in the 1970's. When the narration becomes distracting, I found myself sinking out of the exposition and into the visuals or archival footage, which leads me to say this film is much more a visual/audio trip than anything else.

Yet this shouldn't distract too heavily from the great qualities The Missing Picture provides us, be them visually or narratively, as it tells us a story many of us haven't heard from a perspective we never quiet expected.

Directed by: Rithy Panh.

The past recaptured

[Baceseras · 10/10 · 21 June 2014]

The Khmer Rouge tried to leave no traces of the Cambodian genocide (1975-79). It could be a crime for anyone outside the Party to have pencil and paper, not to mention camera or tape recorder. Scarcely any images got out.

Rithy Panh was thirteen when his family was rounded up. along with the other residents of Phnom Penh, and sent to "re-education" camps and then five years of starvation and rural labor. Now as a survivor looking back at those years, he uses simple clay figures to represent the people who died unrecorded. He juxtaposes them with scraps of propaganda films and other footage, and with manufactured landscapes, while narrating a major 20th century horror story that's also a personal and national tragedy.

The film takes all kinds of aesthetic risks: the images are complexly beautiful, but they dare to seem simplistic or naïve, or to skirt "bad taste." The simplicity is more than justified though, as The Missing Picture does recapture a lost time, the artistic triumph inseparable from the human triumph.

A Vision of Purity

[iluque00 · 7/10 · 23 March 2014]

Rithy Panh fled his native Cambodia for Thailand in 1979, and soon after his family died in a refugee camp. Panh ended up in Paris and became interested in film. Life under the Khmer Rouge and its legacy became the subject matter of his new life as a film director in France. His latest documentary "The Missing Picture" deals with those who were children from 1975 to 1979 when the communist movement seized the Cambodian capital and introduced a system of death resulting in a society so impoverished that private property was reduced to slogans or empty promises. In one of the film's most chilling mise-en-scènes, bank notes fall from the sky in Phnom Penh.

"The Missing Picture" invites us to a faraway country of nostalgia, where clay figurines represent, in many cases, the dead. The figurines find their place in the imagination somewhere between painting and animation; it's stop motion without motion, but by holding the figurines still, it is the heart that moves, or at least that's the idea. This is a difficult film to watch. Part of what you make of a film is what you bring to it, contrary to the belief that all films screen in the mind on a tabula rasa. "The Missing Picture" requires patience, imagination and a considerable amount of effort toward empathy because it's nearly impossible to identify with extreme suffering from genocide. You have to wonder if it's not the job of the director to make this easier? Does Panh overindulge in telling a story? But more importantly, is this a story that can be told? Panh has very few pictures from the genocide; he uses a French, first-person narrative; and there are no witnesses from his family that can testify of his highly personal memoir. Why should we believe him? After all the narrator, Randal Douc says, "there is no truth, there is only cinema". Only by using this radical lens to look at Panh's work can we gauge the level of loneliness in Panh. In a way it is madness, a vision of purity alien to the world, and Panh has nothing to show for it, hence, the title "The Missing Picture".

From passages of this film you realize that it takes little to satisfy man: work and food. And it is only in man's dreams that complexity arises. "It starts with purity, and ends with hate," says the narrator. Aren't the two, hate and purity, just different sides of the same coin? Many atrocities have been carried out in the name of purity. At intervals, throughout the film, waves wash over the screen as a symbol of purity. The freedom that Panh's father died for, is tragically a pretense of purity. When the families share their food, there is more hunger than food so they mostly share their hunger, and hunger is a pretense of purity. Reeducating people in the rice fields--after being forced out of their homes and into the countryside--is a pretense of purity. "Childhood is a constant refrain" says the narrator, but childhood is also a pretense of purity. There is something missing in all this, purity. And tragically all there is to show is hate.

Stark Depiction of Life Under the Tyranny of the Pol Pot Regime

[l_rawjalaurence · 8/10 · 26 May 2014]

Several reviewers have commented on the basic themes of Rithy Panh's documentary; what is perhaps more interesting is the way in which the title operates on two levels. First, Panh's film aims to fill in "the missing picture" of life in Cambodia under the Pol Pot regime. For most of the time, the only visual material available on this regime was propaganda films depicting an idealized world of workers happily contributing to the new country Kampuchea's collective sense of well- being. Through a mixture of clay figures and archive footage, Panh proves the opposite; most citizens had to get used to a combination of perpetual hunger and enforced labor. The clay figures are an important element of this film, suggesting that human beings can be rendered malleable in any way their makers/ captors choose. At another level, the film tries to recreate the "missing picture" of Panh's past; at the age of fifty, he looks back at his childhood in the pre-Pol Pot era, a world of color and variety that was ruthlessly swept away, as the people were forced to wear black and work inhumanly long hours in the rice- fields. The experience left an indelible mark on Panh's character, as he lost most of his family due to starvation, without being able to do a thing about it. Even now he feels guilty for his inaction. Living under a tyrannous regime was bad enough, but what was much worse for Panh was the way in which that regime rendered him powerless, as well as depriving his life of the possibilities - both personal as well as professional - that could have been available in the pre-Pol Pot era. The "missing picture" cannot be recreated, however hard he tries. The film ends on a somber note, as Panh reminds us how much the souls of the millions who died during the Pol Pot regime still haunt those who survived. While efforts have been made to erase the past (a lake has been built over one of the mass graves), he still feels somehow united with the dead rather than the living - an indication, perhaps, of the emotional and physical consequences of tyranny. While THE MISSING PICTURE offers a country-specific interpretation of the past, its message should be heeded by everyone about the consequences of living under an absolutist government.

Could've been better

[Red_Identity · 9 December 2014]

I love me some slow, moody, atmospheric and introspective films. Yet I found this to be really, really slow at times. The premise of using clay figurines is a great one, and at times it really added to the film's power by not forcing images and allowing us to use our imagination, but it was used a lot and together with sort of ho-hum archival footage, and the dreamy narration, I'd be lying if I said I didn't find the film to be really slow to watch at times. It just got a bit repetitive and the subject matter wasn't presented in a more fascinating way. Still, I found some of it effective and the film is pretty original in that way so I have to give it props where they are due.

Where pictures are missing

[sol- · 6/10 · 18 January 2016]

"A picture can be stolen - a thought cannot" states the narrator of this documentary about the atrocities committed by Khmer Rouge in late 1970s Cambodia. While not actually narrated by him for reasons unknown, the script for the film is written by director Rithy Panh, a survivor of the atrocities, in an usual touch, Panh uses clay figures to depict incidents he experienced but for which no archive footage exists. Going back to that earlier quote, the film stands up as a testament of the human mind to recall personal horrors in great detail as one's thoughts can never be stolen. The clay figures are remarkably detailed and especially effective in a moment when Panh recalls drinking muddied water while watched by seemingly stunned local herds. Unique as the film may be though, it outstays its welcome long before it is over. The narration is extremely repetitive and as the film keeps focusing on emotions that its director personally felt, it crosses the border into maudlin territory while ultimately becoming less a document of the times and more the faded memories of a single man. The film is very deliberately paced too so one really needs to be in the right mood to appreciate it. The clay work is, however, never less than remarkable and as the film takes time to focus on Panh also creating all the models, sculpting then painting them, it is hard not to admire the care and consideration put into them. This was clearly a very personal film for Panh and the fact that the film makes one want to read up more about the Khmer Rouge horrors certainly says something.

I see an analogy

[lee_eisenberg · 10/10 · 16 February 2014]

Above all else, Rithy Panh's Oscar-nominated documentary "L'image manquante" ("The Missing Picture" in English) is a testament to the determination of the human spirit. He uses clay figures to tell the story of the Khmer Rouge's killing fields in Cambodia, recounting how the group's attempts to rid Cambodia of anything regarded as western or educated caused one of the great tragedies of the twentieth century.

Another thing that it made me think is a similar phenomenon that we see today. Much like how the Khmer Rouge sought to eradicate all intellectualism and declared Year Zero, the Tea Party and its supporters in politics rant against "elitism", saying that they want to make America like it's "supposed to be". How soon before these people launch their own Khmer Rouge-style social engineering program?

Either way, it's a great documentary. You should definitely see it.

Unique portrayal of a human holocaust

[Buddy-51 · 8/10 · 19 August 2014]

History, it is said, is written by the victors. But sometimes, it is the victims - or more accurately, the survivors - who get to do the writing. That is the case with Rithy Panh, a Cambodian who survived the horrors of life under the Khmer Rouge in the 1970s. Panh was a mere child when he suffered the loss of his parents and siblings in the various grueling work camps to which they had been consigned. As an adult, Panh went on to become a documentary filmmaker dedicated to telling his story to the world. It was a purge aimed mainly at the intelligentsia of Cambodian society - the well-off and educated - who posed the greatest threat to the regime's vision of a collectivist agrarian utopia.

Where, Panh asks, are all the pictures of children starving, of people being worked into the grave that more accurately portray the reality of this 20th Century holocaust? Somehow, those were not recorded and preserved for posterity. Instead, we get a series of grainy propaganda images - of workers seemingly happy in their toil, of leaders of the revolution inspiring the masses with their promises of a Communist paradise - that were officially sanctioned by the government. So Panh has taken it upon himself to provide the "missing" pictures the Pol Pot regime failed to provide to the world.

The Oscar-nominated documentary "The Missing Picture" is a stark, haunting illustration of what life was like under Pol Pot's brutal dictatorship. The director alternates between grainy, mostly black-and- white footage taken at the time and diorama-style re-creations using strategically arranged and intricately carved clay figurines. These frozen, expressionless figures, with their searching, unblinking eyes, lift the suffering that the actual people endured to a near-surreal level, while the wistful, soft-spoken narration by Jean-Baptiste Phou echoes the human tragedy at the core. Indeed, the approach Panh has taken manages to personalize a holocaust that, given its enormous breadth and scope - an estimated one to three million people died under the regime - would otherwise be incomprehensible to the human mind. "The Missing Picture," by "going small," paradoxically helps us to see the tragedy writ large.

Clay figures can't compensate for missing pictures

[mccarthyedits · 5/10 · 8 July 2014]

I watched The Missing Picture (2013, dir. Rithy Panh) last night and thought how clay figures can't compensate for missing pictures. I thought I was going to enjoy the film when it opened with poetic narration and a mesmerizing piece of archival film depicting a Cambodian dancer and the years prior to the Pol Pot takeover. However, as the film started relying more on static clay figures and less on archival footage I began to lose interest. Panh's story is remarkable and beautifully told, but the clay figures, although quite expressive in their design and arrangement, reminded more of an award winning high school diorama than the visuals for an award winning documentary film.

A very special film

[PoppyTransfusion · 10/10 · 21 May 2014]

This is a documentary about one person's experiences under the Khmer Rouge in Cambodia between 1975-1979 when the country was called Kampuchea. The trauma of the horrors visited upon survivors of this period do not make for an easy telling. The film maker opted for an unusual and novel approach; recreating the story and events using miniature figurines that he hand carved. Lots and lots of figurines with hand made sets to accompany them. The images reminded me at times of the war/hell scenes for which the Chapman brothers are famous. It is a most effective medium for drawing a person into an arena of horror.

Anyone with knowledge of trauma survivors knows that retelling a traumatic story is not always a good course for the survivor. Using the figurines to depict the worst moments witnessed by the film maker facilitates the story in a way that is more separate. The separateness allows the survivor to engage without traumatising themselves further. Bravo to the film maker for finding the means by which to bear witness. This is one of those films where the form is the most significant feature of the film.

Accompanying the stunning visuals, which includes archive footage and photographs also, is a narrator whose speech is spare and poetic. I stopped my DVD and wrote out many of the lines; so simply and beautifully did they express a thought or feeling. One of the most important underpins some of the motivation for making the film:

"To hang on you must hide within yourself a strength, a memory, an idea that no one can take from you. For if a picture can be stolen, a thought cannot."

Later he says: "There are many things that man should not see or know. Should he see them, he'd be better off dying. But should any of us see or know them then he must live to tell of them."

In a situation where everything is taken from you and you are left with but two things - an outfit of black clothing and a spoon for eating meagre amounts of food - to be able to retain something of one's self, which includes people known, places visited, experiences, memories of a physical home and possessions, becomes essential to survival with mind intact. Furthermore if one survives an atrocity then the survivors have a duty, unsought but one nonetheless, to bear witness so that the atrocity might be known, acknowledged and learnt from. The film maker did both.

At age 13 the film maker and his family became prisoners of the Khmer Rouge when they invaded the capital city. During their years of hypocritical rule, as seems to be the case for every dictatorship, the film maker lost his dad, who chose to die, his mother, his siblings and his large extended family. He was one of those chosen to bury the dead in mass graves and knows not how he endured such a life but his retelling is piquant to say the least. The Khmer Rouge regime reminded me of the Nazi concentration camps. It reminds me that the Holocaust was not a defining moment in human history for such evil has happened before and since.

The title, the missing picture, is the main theme. It is a trope for the film maker's means of bearing witness. The archive footage is mostly propaganda. It does not show the effects of the society being promoted. The film maker had no photographs of his father withered from his fatal hunger strike. He has no photos of the minuscule food portions given to the adults and children whose lives consisted of endless hard labour. He has no photographs for the mud he drank in lieu of water. So he is recreating these photographs with his figurines and puppet sets. He is showing us the photographs in the only way he can; it matters that we see what he saw and heard and felt.

One would not expect such a film to be beautiful but this is; from the images, the form, the narration, the film maker's weary and collected wisdom. I was startled by the descriptions, photographs and songs from Cambodia pre-Khmer Rouge, or perhaps I should say from Phnom Penh - its capital, because it was so westernised. It was shocking to see what the leaders of the Khmer Rouge did to the city and its people. The film maker concludes: "This missing picture I now hand over to you so that it never ceases to seek us out." Humans seem destined to visit atrocities upon one another. If we cannot avoid such a fate then at least we can attend to the witnesses of this aspect of human life.

"At the start of totalitarianism is falsity"

[ravikishore28 · 9/10 · 17 October 2014]

"The missing picture" is a novel form of documentary cinema. The theme is the Khmer rouge regime in Cambodia. This heartbreaking story is told using clay figurines in sets built from wood, leaves, clay and water. Suddenly you'll be inside villages in rain forests witnessing human inflicted hunger, death, rot and suffering. It's a story of how a twelve year old kid looses his father, mother, sister and brother to ideology, flags, slogans and submissiveness of human thought.

This film captures his pain with far greater purity because the viewer's mind knows that Clay figures are not actors, actors act (they lie). The figurines are real, they are suffering clad in black clothes, armed with a wooden spoon. The figurine portray the resistance in those unfortunate souls by the same mode - a tiny gesture and silence.

Camera-work for such miniature sets is a display of pure innovation and diligence on the creator's part. The background score is perfect, you can hear the sounds of the forest, tilling of the earth or playing of children in the distance. The narration has no room for sensationalism, the pain, sarcasm and anger is heartfelt and the story is personal.

Every viewer owes it to those lost lives to never let the tragedy happen again.

Marvelous depiction of unfortunate series of events

[shagnificent · 10/10 · 1 December 2022]

I watched this movie at a film festival in Doha back in 2016.

The movie is in French, there are no live actors in it, yet its one of the most beautifully told story on real events on Khmer Rouge. It is very hard to pull off a feat like this......This movie left me in tears!

The best part was that the Director Rithy Panh was also there for the Q&A in the end which probably amplified the impact of the movie.

The movie compelled me to visit Cambodia as I was truly touched and think its a must watch for us to learn about the atrocities of Khmer Rouge that was one of the biggest genocide of our time.

More well-made than any movie you have ever seen

[soheilroghani · 9/10 · 23 April 2021]

This film is one of the most creative and well-made films in the history of cinema, you may have seen this kind of filmmaking in children's entertainment programs for children and teenagers, but here Rithy Panh deals with the Cambodian genocide in the mid-70s. It is commendable, I must say that this film won the Un Certain Regard Award of Cannes Film Festival 2013 . Personally , I liked this movie much more than Angelina Jolie's movie (first they killed my father) which was made in 2017. If the movie had given me a little more information about the Pol Pot ( Comrade number one) how Khmer Rouge got stronger and fell from power ( By Vietnam ), I would have given this well-made and concerned film a perfect 10 out of 10.