Film
Angkor Awakens: A Portrait of Cambodia
Angkor Awakens: A Portrait of Cambodia is a 2017 feature documentary by Robert H. Lieberman about Cambodia decades after the Khmer Rouge genocide.[1][2] It follows Cambodians working to recover their culture and history, and asks how baksbat, Khmer for "broken courage," still shapes the country.[3][4]
Synopsis
The film moves through about 50 years of Cambodian history, set against the longer past of the Angkor Empire, which lasted from the ninth to the 15th century.[5][6] It covers the French protectorate and independence in 1953, and a country that prospered in the 1950s and 1960s.[6][7] It then turns to American bombing during the Vietnam War, the 1970 coup and the civil unrest that brought the Khmer Rouge to power.[6]
The film shows the regime's rule from 1975 to 1979: the killing of intellectuals, famine, mass graves and piles of skulls. It gives an estimated two million deaths in that period.[6] Survivors recall that they first saw the Khmer Rouge as liberators, before they understood the regime's extreme ideology.[7] Others speak of child soldiers, fathers taken away and the struggle to survive.[8]
The documentary also looks at the Cambodia of today: its young population, the continuing legacy of violence, present-day repression, and the silence and selective memory around the Khmer Rouge years.[2][9][8] Children of survivors talk about what their parents and grandparents lived through, and about the hopes of a new generation to heal and rebuild.[5][9] One speaker in the film calls this inherited trauma "broken courage," a form of post-traumatic stress.[6]
Production and credits
Lieberman, a Cornell physics professor and novelist whose earlier film was They Call It Myanmar, directed the film and produced it with Deborah C. Hoard.[6][2][4] David Kossack wrote it.[1] PhotoSynthesis Productions and Ithaca Filmworks produced it, and it was filmed on location in Cambodia.[4][1] The film was cut from 200 hours of footage and combines archival film, photographs and interviews with everyday Cambodians, former officials and experts.[5][7] Appearing in it are Sam Rainsy, Hun Sen, Tioulong Saumura, Richard Solomon and Andrew Mertha.[9] It is in English and Khmer, and it is also known as Baksbat.[1]
An 80-minute version screened at Cornell Cinema in October 2016.[8] The 2017 release runs 90 minutes, and Alexander Street lists a 50-minute version.[1][4]
Release and reception
Journeyman Pictures released the film in a limited theatrical run in the United States on May 5, 2017, and it came out for streaming on June 14, 2017.[9] After a screening at Sunshine Cinemas, Lieberman answered questions from the audience.[5]
The film was an official selection of the 2017 Cambodia Town Film Festival, which presented it as a portrait of a nation at a political and cultural tipping point. It screened on September 17, 2017 at the Art Theatre in Long Beach, California, in Khmer with English subtitles, and all proceeds went to the Khmer Arts Academy and the Khmer Alumni Association.[2]
Tom Keogh of The Seattle Times called it "a riveting and illuminating documentary."[3] Peter Rainer of The Christian Science Monitor found it comprehensive and compelling.[3] The Washington Post wrote that Cambodian voices give the film a glimmer of light.[3] In the Bay Area Reporter, Erin Blackwell criticized it as aimed at investors rather than as a critical history.[9]
Watch
References
- ↑ 1.0 1.1 1.2 1.3 1.4 IMDb, Angkor Awakens: A Portrait of Cambodia
- ↑ 2.0 2.1 2.2 2.3 Cambodia Town Film Festival, CTFF 2017 Official Selection: Angkor Awakens: A Portrait of Cambodia (archived)
- ↑ 3.0 3.1 3.2 3.3 Metacritic, Angkor Awakens: A Portrait of Cambodia
- ↑ 4.0 4.1 4.2 4.3 Alexander Street, Angkor Awakens
- ↑ 5.0 5.1 5.2 5.3 StageBuddy, Review: Angkor Awakens: A Portrait of Cambodia (May 24, 2017)
- ↑ 6.0 6.1 6.2 6.3 6.4 6.5 The New York Times, Review: 'Angkor Awakens,' a Blistering Account of Cambodia's Painful Past (May 3, 2017)
- ↑ 7.0 7.1 7.2 The Seattle Times, 'Angkor Awakens' review: Documentary outlines the rise of the Khmer Rouge and its bloody legacy (May 25, 2017)
- ↑ 8.0 8.1 8.2 The Cornell Daily Sun, A Story of Selective Remembrance: Angkor Awakens at Cornell Cinema (October 5, 2016)
- ↑ 9.0 9.1 9.2 9.3 9.4 Rotten Tomatoes, Angkor Awakens: A Portrait of Cambodia