The Look of Silence

The Look of Silence (, "Silence") is a 2014 internationally co-produced documentary film directed by Joshua Oppenheimer about the Indonesian mass killings of 1965–66. The film is a companion piece to his 2012 documentary The Act of Killing. Executive producers were Werner Herzog, Errol Morris, and Andre Singer. It was nominated for the Academy Award for Best Documentary Feature at the 88th Academy Awards. Overview Adi Rukun, a middle-aged Indonesian optometrist, has lived his whole life in an environment shaped by the unending grief his parents feel over the brutal murder of his older brother in the 1965 Indonesian Communist Purge, which occurred two years before Adi's birth. He watches extra footage from Oppenheimer's The Act of Killing project, which includes video of the men who killed his brother, and decides to visit and interview some of the killers and their collaborators—which turn out to include his uncle—under the pretense of giving them an eye exam. Although none of the killers expresses any remorse, the daughter of one of them is clearly shaken when she hears, apparently for the first time, the details of the killings. Interspersed between the confrontations are scenes of Adi's elderly mother and almost deaf and blind father. Out of concern for their safety, many members of the film's Indonesian crew are credited only as "Anonymous". Release The film was screened in the official competition at the 71st Venice International Film Festival, where it won the Grand Jury Prize, the International Film Critics Award (FIPRESCI), the Italian online critics award (Mouse d'Oro), the European Film Critics Award (FEDEORA), as well as the Human Rights Nights Award. Since then, it has gone on to win multiple awards, including Best World Documentary (Cinephile Prize) at the Busan International Film Festival, the Grand Prize (DOX Award) at CPH:DOX, the prize for Best Documentary at the Starz Denver Film Festival, a Danish Arts Council Award for outstanding achievement in filmmaking, and the Best Film Award at the One World human rights documentary film festival.