Thinking about Rithy Panh

How often do you get the chance to stare directly into the face of evil? S21 gives you that chance, and what do you know - evil's face looks just like everybody else's. - Joshua Tanzer, OffOffOff.com

A recent thread on the Rotten Tomatoes Forum made me think about "visually stunning" Asian films, and of course I responded to the poster by offering up more than a half dozen Thai films, with Tears of the Black Tiger being my first recommendation.

I guess that's what it was that made me fall in love with Tears of the Black Tiger, was its visually stunning look. I caught the movie back in 2001 on a visit to Bangkok when I was living in Phnom Penh. I saw it in back-to-back showings at The Emporium with Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon. If you want visually stunning, there are probably not two finer examples than those films. And I saw them for the first time in one day at the theatre.

What does this have to do with Rithy Panh? Well, when I thought more about visually stunning, I thought about two of his films that I'd seen - The Rice People and Land of Wandering Souls. He's not Thai; he's Cambodian and was trained in France. But his films definitely fit within this group, as they represent a style - for lack of better terminology, the "visually stunning Asian style".

Turns out Rithy made a film last year called S21: The Khmer Rouge Killing Machine. Anyhow, I hope someday to see this movie, as well as see Rice People and Wandering Souls again.

A feature and links to Rithy's film can be found at Sixbillion.org.