BroadcastChic Excellent, a Must See

Bereamic Awesome Movie

Robert Joyner The plot isn't so bad, but the pace of storytelling is too slow which makes people bored. Certain moments are so obvious and unnecessary for the main plot. I would've fast-forwarded those moments if it was an online streaming. The ending looks like implying a sequel, not sure if this movie will get one

Quiet Muffin This movie tries so hard to be funny, yet it falls flat every time. Just another example of recycled ideas repackaged with women in an attempt to appeal to a certain audience.

Najmie bin Maliki I'm a Malaysian, Indonesia is our neighbour. I often watch or read stories of the Jews under the Nazis, or the bourgeoisie during Red Terror, or the Tutsis during Rwandan genocide. It often felt distant or surreal. I cannot imagine the fear, or the horrible concoction of emotions they go through at that moment. Or what is the story from the killers' perspective.But this story is so close to me. Indonesians speak the same mother tongue as me. I went there a few times. It's chilling.Rather than telling the story from the victims' perspective - which might draw sympathy from audience or even disgust towards the perpetrators - telling the story from the killers' perspective brings the storytelling to a whole different level. Shock value. They didn't show any remorse or trauma of participating in the mass killings. They give euphemisms to the act of killings like 'ending their lives' or 'switching them off' (matikan).I'm going to drop some spoilers here, but I won't consider it as spoilers anyway, this is a real historical event, you can read it on the internet or books. The main character, a former executioner during that communist purge (where an estimated one to two million were murdered) told that he once chopped off a head with a machete, and the rolling head had his eyes open and stared blankly. That gave him nightmares, not the fact that he chopped someone's head off, but because he didn't close the eyes and that stare gave him nightmares.The director (who was born in the USA, had British citizenship, based in Denmark but spoke Indonesian) went there to do a reenactment movie of the 1965 mass murders. These former executioners went to villages and asked villagers to participate in acting as victims. Some kids actually genuinely cried during those reenactment scenes. Most of the villages they went were actually descendants of the murdered victims.The director also had clips of governor, ministers and even the vice president openly talking about empowering gangsters to continue exterminate communists. There was one scene where there's a conversation degrading a woman who had to perform sex acts to multiple men, then the same people prayed to God.Descendants of the murdered were denied education, rights, and probably still are. While the murderers look like they don't mind doing it again, and not difficult too, as they are still in power. It shows in the credits, it was full of anonymous.

Asif Khan (asifahsankhan) Like most other documentaries about people who are certifiably insane, The Act of Killing raises questions about the exploitation of its subjects. Namely: Is it even possible to exploit men who freely and in some cases gleefully admit to the torture, rape, and murder of untold scores of their countrymen? And also: Why would these people not only want to speak about their guilt but also participate in a film that re-stages their crimes with them in the starring roles?Harrowing, confrontational and surreal, The Act of Killing ends with Anwar Congo, the gangster who murdered nearly 1,000 people in 1965- 66 following the military coup in Indonesia, coming to terms with his heinous crimes. Possibly. He sobs, vomits and laments the lives he had will-fully taken away, and yet we're never sure if he's genuinely repentant or if it's all a high-wire act on his part. But we want to believe that he is; we want to believe that justice is possible; that the killers may one day live through the agony they inflicted on the one million people they butchered. That's the hidden drive behind Joshua Oppenheimer's formally innovative debut feature. Few films have dared to capture the full spectrum of human evil so candidly, so perceptively, as Oppenheimer does in his inconceivable non-fiction epic in which the Texas-born Danish film- maker convinces members of the death squads to reenact their murders in the style of their favourite Hollywood films. The Act of Killing is a piercing, multi-layered study about national amnesia, about the power of self-deceit and the questionable morality of truth-seeking. Its status as the 21st Century's most celebrated documentary will likely be preserved for a long time to come.It is arguable, however, that neither of these venerated directors has made a film quite this unnerving. But then neither has ever tackled a country whose modern history was written by the winners, in blood and in broad daylight. At times, The Act of Killing seems to be unfolding in a parallel, science-fictional universe where self-described thugs are celebrated on talk shows as cultural warriors and keepers of the flame, and their audiences—and their family members—don't bat an eye. (The relatives of victims, meanwhile, are too scared to say anything.) The discombobulating quality is heightened by the re-enactments, which were written, directed, and acted by the film's subjects, self- erected monuments to their perceived righteousness and ruthlessness. Oppenheimer, meanwhile, exhibits patience, guile, opportunism, and, above all, an iron-stomached curiosity about where his subjects' artistic whims and HD-sharp memories will take them (and him) next. The mythologies on display are, to say the least, unique. For all the movies that have been made about murderers (and mass murderers), it's hard to recall one where the participants were freely hanging out in restaurants or tooling around in the streets in convertibles. Usually, killers are shot in the confines of a prison cell or with their features and voices blurred out. Oppenheimer claims that there was very little coercion involved in getting the men in The Act of Killing to talk about whom they were and what they'd done, and as a result the film has a startlingly casual tone. (One wonders if the 159-minute cut, which won the main prize in November at CPH:DOX is quite so brisk; Oppenheimer denies the rumours of an even longer cut.)

Jesper Rehmeier Joshua Oppenheimers "The Act of Killing" is an experience unlike anything I have ever witnessed before. Its a tour de force of emotions, guilt, evil and redemption. It grabs your heart and punches you in the stomach in a way no other documentary has ever done.Oppenheimer goes to Indonesia to interview some of the leaders of the death squads that were responsible for millions of deaths during the purge of 1965. He find them as aging men with powerful positions in the society they help to shape with violence and brutality that makes you question the very essence of mans capabilities. We meet Anwar Congo. Film lover, fashionista and loving grandpa. And responsible for killing more than 1000 people by himself during the purge. Anwar is viewed as a hero by the people of his community and he has never been brought to consider that what he did was murder. Oppenheimer challenge Anwar Congo and some of friends to recreate some of their killings to make a movie and during the filming, Anwar transforms. He begins to realize that what he did MIGHT have been wrong. Its a heartwarming transformation and a human being is born. The documentary challenges the conventions of the genre and has become the new benchmark for how you can tell a story of such magnitude and complications. You can't afford to miss it!

Bryan Kluger I've never quite seen anything like Joshua Oppenheimer's documentary 'The Act of Killing'. With its horrific subject matter, the film is extremely difficult to watch. Oppenheimer was born in my native state, Texas, but now resides mostly in London. Eight years ago, he embarked on a mission to Indonesia to document the victims of the government sponsored genocide of Communists following the 1965 military takeover.After interviewing some of the victims, the director met a few of the perpetrators who actually carried out the brutal killings. Eventually, his entire film focused on the killers, with no time given to the victims. In an original take on the documentary genre, Oppenheimer allowed these mass murderers not only to laugh and talk fondly about their murders, but even to re-enact them in the form of their favorite types of films, which include old-school gangster movies, horror, and even a musical comedy. These criminals are completely unapologetic about what they did.The documentary mostly follows Anwar Congo, now an elderly man who looks strikingly similar to Nelson Mandela. Congo was one of the lead gangsters that carried out the government sanctioned murders of Indonesian Communists in the '60s. He has killed over one thousand people. Yes, you read that right – one thousand. The government formed paramilitary death squads and hired local street thugs to carry out the killings. Before his mass murders, Congo was a movie ticket scalper. He happily describes how he killed his victims, and explains that his favorite method was strangling them with metal wire, because it was fast and easy to clean up.Congo wasn't alone in the murders. He was joined by another man who now has a family, seems to be well off, has no remorse and is quite enthusiastic about his murderous past. He even gloats about killing his girlfriend's father because he thought the man was a Communist. We also get a glimpse of some of the paramilitary soldiers, one of whom brags about raping 14-year-old girls and killing them. The camera follows a few of the state's leaders and military officials as they travel from local business to local business, shaking down the shop owners for money and threatening violence if they don't pay enough.At a certain point, everything comes back to Anwar Congo, who finally starts to show a hint of remorse for his past evil deeds. He's still haunted in his nightmares by the ghosts of his victims and sometimes wakes up scared. In particular, he's terrified of a guy he beheaded with a machete in the middle of a forest, but didn't close his eyes after killing him. In another pivotal moment, he decides to play the victim in the film, and one of his friends will play a version of himself. As he gets heavily bloodied in makeup, his favorite method of killing is performed on him, which causes him to break down in disbelief that he's done it to so many people.Not only do we see these evil men still alive today – happy, unapologetic and still thinking the same way – we see parts of Indonesia that are solely run by the paramilitary and gangsters, without any hope. It's truly frightening. These evil men are protected by their country and will never receive a single ounce of punishment for what they did.'The Act of Killing' is extremely difficult to watch. At times, you'll want to get out of your seat and demand these men be brought to justice. It's sad, powerful, important, and must be seen. There is a reason that iconic filmmakers Errol Morris and Werner Herzog signed on as executive producers on this. 'The Act of Killing' is a chilling film, one that you won't soon forget.