The Missing Picture

The Missing Picture (2013), directed by Rithy Panh, is a powerful film that documents the period when the Khmer Rouge ruled over Cambodia between 1975 and 1979. This was nominated for Best Foreign Film for the 2014 Academy Awards. Panh's story is personalized and painful as he lost most of his family to starvation, disease, or being disappeared during the upheaval that saw Phnom Penh emptied when the Khmer Rogue took power in 1975. It seems that Panh has survival guilt, something not so uncommon with holocaust survivors. Panh tells his story using carved figures in panoramas he made from his memories from his life experiences. He also uses a lot of archival footage from the time period as well as surviving Khmer Rogue footage that has survived and propaganda films crated by the Khmer Rogue. He broaches subjects such as S21 where western medicine was banned, so they tried to create local cures for the many diseases that ravaged the workers in the work camps. I was surprised and pleased to see some footage from the 60s and 70s that showed the influence of rock-n-roll, in which Panh says his brother had a rock band and was probably killed for being an artist. Ideology kills and as a Buddhist Panh accepts destiny. It is a powerful personal stoey that tells the story of a misguided nation recovering from temporary madness.