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Very very predictable, including the post credit scene !!!

The Worst Film Ever

Pretty good movie overall. First half was nothing special but it got better as it went along.

There is, somehow, an interesting story here, as well as some good acting. There are also some good scenes

This is a hard film to watch. People absolutely gloat over the atrocities they have committed. Or obfuscate their role – as in this or that person was a communist and deserved to die (and be butchered). The interviewers are themselves accused of not having the "correct political outlook" – and given the nature of those making the accusations I would be very worried indeed.There has been no reconciliation or war times tribunals for the war crimes committed in the Aceh region of Indonesia in the 1960's which is what this film is focused on.If one wants to have insight into those who commit mass atrocities this is worthwhile – but the insights may not be what one is hopeful for because there is no sense of remorse from those who committed the crimes. This film goes a long way to support the assumptions of Daniel Goldhagen in his two books "Hitler's Willing Executioners" and "Worse Than War" that those who commit atrocities are willing and active participants, and not blameless automatons.

The Look of Silence is such a brilliant title for this movie. For one, it's a good description of Adi's reaction when hearing about the murder of his brother. (And it's oddly fitting that he is an optometrist). It's also a description of the response they get from the perpetrators, refusing to show any guilt or remorse, preferring to pretend that it never happened. And that seems to be what Oppenheimer is tapping into in Indonesia, the look of silence, and what really lies behind it.This is definitely a companion piece to the previous "Act of Killing". Not because it does not stand on its own, which it does, but because they stand so much stronger together. Each documentary has an unique perspective on some mutual themes. Especially guilt and remorse.It's amazing how it all comes together in a movie like this. Oppenheimer must have done a lot of work for this. Adi is such a good subject for a documentary like this, and having him being willing to explore this dark side of his nation's history, and openly talk to the people who brutally murdered his brother - it's such an unique way to explore all of this. And Adi does a really good job with it all.

Act of Killing I bought with some trepidation and settled down on my own to watch it (and watched again immediately after with the Josh/Werner Herzog background discussion - rather the film background to the discussion). Next day I bought Look of Silence. Watched it next night both without and with the background discussion. I was mesmerised (and still am), and so many questions come to mind.The two films work well together, Act of Killing being more overview and focusing on the killers and the political structure/mob rule that is still in power. Act of Killing doesn't particularly explore how they got away with genocide (why the world turned a blind eye), but this is alluded to carefully and specifically in Look of Silence.I could write so much because the two films together have provoked in me a profound perspective on human horror, which has gripped me most recently with what we see on the news with ISIS (Paris Masacre).What are human beings capable of, and why is an individual able to make such choices? What are the structures that facilitate the most grotesque of human acts of wickedness upon one another. Do we all contain wickedness, does a killer lurk inside us all? Does fear itself propel the killers - kill or be killed? Are we (cells in the human organism) enacting our worst imaginable terror, excising evil, I kill therefore I am?Josh Oppenheimer, I applaud your work. The sensitivity and attention to the finest detail employed in your work is, for me, beyond words. The cinematography, colours you choose, balance in composition. Even the subtitles were easy to read. Beautiful lingering pauses. You said of one still scene, a bridge, pale green, a river bank; you have no words to describe how this scene makes you feel, what the scene says. For me this scene (in LoS) is terrifyingly beautiful, sad, the weight of recent history hanging there in the stillness. Embodying the sadness and fear. I love that still scene.Superb, I do not have the words to describe what your films say to me... I will think about them for a long long time, and watch them again.

******* Minor spoiler warning (nothing major) ******I just saw The Look of silence at the local art house type theater near my house. The title of this film had several meanings to me. Will touch more on that later tho. The Look of Silence is a follow up film to The Act Of Killing. The focus of the film is on a man named Adi whose older brother was killed by the Indonesian Komando Aksi death squads during the 1965 Indonesian genocide. This was during the cold war era, therefore the United States government chose to help Indonesia mass murder millions of suspected communists and make profits from the death and corruption that ensued.Adi's brother Ramli was one such Indonesian that was branded as a communist, therefore the Komando Aksi arrested him and relocated him to a prison camp, from the prison camp he was loaded onto a truck with a bunch of other suspected communists, and driven to Snake River and butchered in horrific form. Ramli was one of the more graphic executions that took place, and many of the death squad leaders still remembered Ramli because of the over the top execution that was done to him. It is really graphic, they not only stabbed him and chopped him up, but they also tossed him into the river to die, when he was crying for help the murderers pulled him back out of the water and cut off his genitals, then he died. A very evil and sadistic way of killing someone.Adi travels around his village and beyond meeting with the death squad leaders who were indirectly, and directly involved with his brothers death, and confronts them about the past and very cleverly and gently recalls the past to them, and in some cases their children, and force them to remember the uncomfortable past that they so desperately try to forget. This seems to be very important to Adi and Josh Oppenheimer that the true story of what really happened does not become forgotten, and to inform current and future generations of Indonesians that the narrative that their government has been going by, is a huge lie and full of propaganda to make the killers look like celebrated heroes of the state. This film is immensely important and the whole world needs to know and make the governments involved take action and own up to the truth. We cannot live in the shadows of tyranny and pretend that it didn't happened.Back to the name of the film. The look of silence was represented to me through the look on the faces of the killers as Adi recalls the gruesome accounts that they were involved with, and the look on Adi's face when the killers seem to not feel remorse for their actions. However, there was an alternate interpretation of the title for me. As I said, I watched this film at the local movie theater, and never have I seen a film anywhere, at any theater in which the audience did not talk or be disruptive at all. It was literally the audience looking at the film in complete silence. Also when the credits rolled, every single person in the theater stayed in their seats until the credits were over, and then walked out of the theater still in silence. Josh is a damn good director and story teller, and I admire him so much for having the courage to make such a film like this one and The Act Of Killing.If you care about history, and humanity you should watch this film. If you only have the capacity for Michael Bay films, then you probably aren't mature enough to handle this film.I give it a 9 out of 10.