Greenes
Please don't spend money on this.
Doomtomylo
a film so unique, intoxicating and bizarre that it not only demands another viewing, but is also forgivable as a satirical comedy where the jokes eventually take the back seat.
Aubrey Hackett
While it is a pity that the story wasn't told with more visual finesse, this is trivial compared to our real-world problems. It takes a good movie to put that into perspective.
theodorapilates
Well maybe I should have watched this when it came out to be as impressed as most viewers here, but I was 6 so even if I did I don't remember it. But I do remember the hype about it. I only watched it in 2018 because so many people reviewing Angelina Jolie's First They Killed My Father kept insisting that this is THE movie to watch if you want to know more about the Cambodian genocide. And that Jolie's movie was uninformative and cheesy. Well, this one is equally uninformative and way more cheesy! Maybe reviewers preferred the story being told my a guy rather than a girl? I have no idea. At least FTKMF left me intrigued to find out more about the situation and I was also immersed in its atmosphere. I can't say the same for this one. It looked like a poor man's Empire of the Sun. Such important stories that need to be told, but it doesn't work every time just because of the shock value. Lastly, as few others already mentioned, this movie was in need of editing. Too long with little substance. Sorry!
classicsoncall
I don't think even this picture can accurately convey the horror of the Khmer Rouge and their policy of Cambodian genocide during the era of the mid-Seventies. It was a terrible time for that country with estimates upward of three million Cambodians massacred by the Pol Pot regime, and all because of an extreme combination of Marxism, Khmer nationalism and xenophobia. When Dith Pran (Haing S. Ngor) stumbled onto the 'Killing Fields' of the film's title while attempting to escape the barbarism of his captors, one can only look on in fascination at an impossibly grotesque landscape. With a more than obvious slant regarding the Khmer Rouge as a by-product of American bombing in Cambodia, one might balance that view with a more careful reading of history, but even so, historians still fall on both sides of the matter. In any case, Cambodia was one of the dominoes that fell during this period with the help of the North Vietnamese Army during the early Seventies.Haing S. Ngor was a fledgling actor when he appeared in this film as Cambodian journalist Dith Pran but one wouldn't know it. The picture and story becomes his following the evacuation of Phnom Penh and the victory of the Khmer Rouge rebels. One can't imagine what emotions and hardships the real Dith Pran must have undergone after the American contingent left. Surviving in turn by drinking cattle blood and relentlessly pursuing any possible means of escape, his story is one for the ages regarding one man's quest for freedom and dignity. There also comes a moment in the film when while viewing today, there's the added poignancy of observing the Twin Towers looming above a New York City landscape when Sydney Schanberg (Sam Waterston) returns home from his Cambodian assignment. To my mind, I don't know of any other film that touches on the Cambodian War and it's attendant horror the way this one does. It was a time when, as Dith Pran so accurately stated at one point - "The enemy is inside us. No one can be trusted." With all that, there's only one question I have about the making of the film and choice of scenic backdrops for much of the action, and that is, just how many times do you think it was necessary to be subjected to all that product placement by Coca-Cola?
saugoof
The story of the Cambodian genocide is one that has practically no parallels in terms of sheer brutality and the impact it has had on a country. And yet this is pretty much the only film that had some sort of widespread reach in the western world. It's a real pity that it wasn't a better film.I did see the movie when it came out originally and while I didn't think it was a brilliant film at the time, it got me interested enough in the subject to read up on in it. Including Dith Pran's book which the film is based upon. Having re-watched it now for the first time in decades and with a lot more background knowledge, the film is full of very big flaws. One of the driving forces for this film is meant to be the friendship between Dith Pran and Sidney Schanberg, but for the first half of the movie, Sidney treats Pran like a low-level employee and there's no real warmth on screen between them. It's only when Pran is forced to leave the French embassy where they've been hiding out and gets sent to a Khmer Rouge labour camp that suddenly this great friendship is highlighted, even though there was little evidence of it shown beforehand.The second half of the movie, with Sidney back in the US and Dith Pran left behind in Cambodia is where the film somewhat hits its stride. That said, reading about his actual experiences, the film feels almost tame in comparison. Roland Joffe also missed a chance of making a bigger impact here by deciding to not use subtitles for any of the Khmer dialog throughout the movie. This means that the second half where it's almost exclusively featuring Cambodians has to work on a visual level for viewers who don't understand the dialog. That means many of the scenes are over-simplified and make them feel less realistic than they should have been.Likely the decision to not use subtitles also means that Dith Pran's time in the killing fields was shortened so much in the movie that it feels like it lasted a couple of weeks rather than the four years it really was.The by far worst aspect of this movie though is the music! I'm sorry but as much respect as I have for Mike Oldfield, he absolutely cannot write movie scores. The music here is so completely out of place and distracting, it ruins all the otherwise great scenes. A perfect example of that is when Pran, Schanberg and a couple of other journalists get captured by Khmer Rouge troops and held hostage in an abandoned Coke factory. What would have been an incredibly tense set of scenes gets absolutely ruined by the music that sounds like it would be better placed in an episode of Gumby. It's so distracting, it almost makes it comical.This is by no means a terrible film. But a few relatively minor changes could have easily made this a great film.
aocontreras
The film is a drama about Cambodia war, which last from 1967 to 1975. Action takes place in the last years of the conflict. Sydney (Sam Waterston) is an American journalist covering the war at the peak of the violence displayed by the government: the Khmer rouge. The plot is based on Sydney's friend: Dith Pran (Haing S. Nor). He is a Cambodian photographer and journalist. Both of them usually face risky situations in different cities where the government is killing innocent people. For instance, a city called Neak Luong, which is destroyed, by mistake, by the American air force in 1973. The ruling party decides to expel foreigners and this represents a twist in the story. Both characters are forced to be separated; and facing opposite situations. Dith has to live in a concentration camp. In this place all the citizens were forced to work and to accept the party's ideas. If they did not obey, then they were killed. On the other hand, Sydney returns to a safe America. He begins the search of his friend and colleague in hopes of finding him alive. I enjoyed the film. However, the plot is sad and sometimes cruel. I highly recommend it because the story is still relevant.
