About 35% of the audience so far rated this documentary '10', while on the other end of the scale more than 15% of the audience so far gave it a devastating '1'. Now, it seems clear that there seem to be a lot of pros to this film, but what about the contras? Who is so much against this feature and why? What do you think?
There are many people in Indonesia that don't want this part of their history to be remembered (those involved in the genocide, Suharto regime, etc.), I'm guessing that's where a lot of the 1s are coming from.
There are many people in Indonesia that don't want this part of their history to be remembered (those involved in the genocide, Suharto regime, etc.), I'm guessing that's where a lot of the 1s are coming from.
I wouldn't be so quick to conclude that. As soupphysics and Roy_Bland said, there are many people who give movies a 1 simply because they dislike the film and cannot open their minds enough to give credit for any of its merits. There are some like The Guardian's Nick Fraser who compared the first of the two films, The Act of Killing, to a snuff movie because they just couldn't bring themselves to contemplate that killers are recognisably human, and not "monsters" who can be comfortably distanced from us. The same psychology is likely to operate within a lot of IMDB viewers.
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Regardless of the 1's. It a shame how many people DO overlook this part of their history like the Snake River killings. The brutal killings and the drinking of the blood is as creepy as it gets for me. As the daughter of one of the killers said his doings were "sadistic". The lack of guilt of the murderers in this documentary is frustrating. Once these murderers die so probably will the dark history of Indonesia's past will too. It's unfortunate and should not be forgotten no matter how gory the details are.
Maybe some of the 1s are based on the fact people found the documentary boring. I didn't ... I thought it was totally compelling ..... but if you don't have an interest in the subject then it was basically a mix of people sitting and talking, the main guy watching videos, and home scenes where he talks to his parents and they are filmed going about their everyday lives. There is nothing remotely entertaining about this IF you are not interested in the topic. I have watched documentaries on subjects I had no initial interest in but found myself entertained by the films themselves. I gave it a 7, a fascinating topic and made incredibly human, but it fell quite a bit short of The Act of Killing in terms of entertainment value. There were too many drawn out scenes of the elderly father, whose deteriorating condition does not seem to have any real relevance until the end when he is shown to be forgetting that he has a murdered son. A deeply moving and appalling subject, brought painfully to life, but not for those who have no interest.