Review of The Act of Killing (2012) by Garrett A — 28 Feb 2014

This is the most disturbing thing I have ever seen. It is chilling to look into the eyes of these people who are proud of killing countless innocent people. They feel no remorse. This film is twisted in so many ways. They laugh and joke about it. It is truly something that is hard to forget.

While all the content is there for a great film, the film making is not. There was no order to what was happening. It hardly, or sometimes did not at all, explained what was happening. For the first half of the movie, I couldn't tell what was happening when. It is also a disappointment that they did not talk to more of these men like Anwar. Sure we got a brief look at a couple others, but it really just scratched the surface. The only part that made sense chronologically was the last 15 or 20 minutes. Those last few minutes were unforgettable. Yet, an amateur film maker would know those must appear at the end, so it is hard for me to give much credit for that. I think it could have been much better organized, and had potential to be a 100%, a very rare feat for me.

Throughout much of the much, I also got the impression that this movie was self-serving. It obviously was. The first two hours were spent trying to make themselves look good, in their view. It was hard to tell for sure because their views are so demented, but this was certainly the case. The problem is that everything was obviously biased. I had to even question some of the things that they were saying and doing. The film only addresses that issue once when the leader who comes to film at the village burning scene talks about the impression he is trying to give. What was their goal? I believe it was to scare people. They were trying to scare people into submission by showing what they are capable of.

In any case, the transformation of Anwar is the main story in the film, and while I think it could have been done better, what it had was absolutely chilling, which is exactly what it was trying to do.