Internationale anmeldere fulde af respekt

VENEDIG. De internationale anmeldere røres af Joshua Oppenheimers "The Look of Silence", og instruktøren bliver rost for at træde nye veje i sin store beretning om det indonesiske folkemord.

Joshua Oppenheimers "The Look of Silence" blev vist for verdenspressen i går, den 27. august, på Venedig Filmfestivalen. Oppenheimers opfølger til den Oscar-nominerede "The Act of Killing", retter denne gang fokus mod ofrene for folkedrabet i Indonesien i 1965-66 frem for bødlerne. De internationale anmeldere er fulde af respekt.

The Guardian

Peter Bradshaw fra britiske The Guardian giver fem ud af fem mulige stjerner og opsummerer, at "The Look of Silence – like The Act of Killing – is arresting and important film-making."

Bradshaw sammenholder som alle andre anmeldere den ny film med "The Act of Killing", og beskriver "The Look of Silence" som "(..) just as piercingly and authentically horrifying as before. It is filmed with exactly the same superb visual sense, the same passionate love of the Indonesian landscape, and dialogue exchanges are captured with the same chilling crispness."

De to store brancheblade, Screen og Variety, og branchewebsitet Indiewire er lige så imponerede.

Variety

"(..) an altogether stunning companion piece that shifts its emphasis from the perpetrators of the atrocity to their victims, all the while maintaining its predecessor’s ornate moral complexities, keen sociological shading and occasional, devastating jabs of humor."

"So involving is the raw content of 'The Look of Silence' that some might view its formal elegance as mere luxury, yet the film reveals Oppenheimer to be a documentary stylist of evolving grace and sophistication. Lars Skree’s luminescent lensing provides an invaluable assist to the range and depth of testimony on show here (..)"

LookOfSilence-Venice-Twitte
På festivalens Twitter-acount.

Screen

Screen er lige så begejstret og fremhæver, at de to film med Oppenheimers særlige greb skaber forandringer.

"Oppenheimer’s twin Indonesian documentaries are not mere records; they make things happen (something that earned 'Act of Killing' accusations of manipulating its subjects, which sort of misses the point of a film that uses filmic manipulations as an antidote to national brainwashing). The way films can make things happen is central to 'The Look Of Silence'."

Indiewire

Indiewire er betaget af instruktørens brug af virkemidler og hans evne til at disponere fortællingen.

"Oppenheimer has found new tones and textures that make the spellbinding 'The Look of Silence' its equal in almost every other way." (Her sammenlignet med "The Act of Killing")

"Oppenheimer’s skill as a storyteller, as opposed to just a journalist, seems boundless, especially enhanced by having such an extraordinarily sympathetic on-camera interviewer as Adi."
(Adi er bror til en ung mand, der blev myrdet under massakrerne i Indonesien i 1965-66. Han er filmens hovedkarakter, der opsøger sin brors bødler her snart 50 år efter.)

"Shifting his focus from the attackers to the victims for this film, Oppenheimer undoubtedly manipulates the narrative, and occasionally allows digressions that, in not being strictly relevant to the documentary’s intent, could almost be read as prurient. The scene of Adi’s enfeebled father crawling around a room he does not recognize, in vocal distress at being so helpless, is brilliant as a metaphor but borderline exploitative as an observed moment. So too the lingering shots of his naked, skeletal form as his wife washes him down, or the closeups of his gurning, toothless mouth. And yet it’s in these moments and others like them that it becomes clear just what a visionary filmmaker Oppenheimer is and how much he has matured in the last few years. They illustrate an audacious desire to overtly mould and shape his film to the degree that it strains at the leash of the traditional documentary format, if it doesn’t entirely redefine it. It’s as compellingly crafted, in its use of imagery and especially in its soundtrack, marked by the almost perpetual whine of crickets that makes the titular silence audible, as any narrative film."