The Act of Killing (Director’s Cut)

After the 1965 coup d’état in Indonesia, Anwar Congo and his cronies went from petty criminals to official executioners of the military regime, helping the army annihilate more than one million communists, foreigners and intellectuals in less than a year. Today, the members of this ruthless death squad are still protected by the government and instead of answering for the hideous crimes, they brag about them on daytime TV. Joshua Oppenheimer and his collaborators invited them to recount their deeds on camera and they respond with enthusiasm. Congo and his associates chose to tell their story in the style of a big Hollywood production, influenced by their favorite gangster films, westerns and musicals, taking on the multiple roles of director, scriptwriter and lead actors! The result is a documentary unlike anything you have ever seen before, an outrageous, skin-crawling and almost surreal nightmare about the paranoia that rules an entire society that’s built on the blood of innocent people, as seen through the eyes of the megalomaniac perpetrators. Nominated for Academy Award for Best Documentary Feature in 2014, the film appeared on the top of several best film lists, praised by critics and audiences alike.