Page - 31 - in JRFM - Journal Religion Film Media, Volume 04/01

The Banality of Ghosts | 31www.jrfm.eu 2018, 4/1, 15–34 impactful, it’s because there’s a moment when you watch the film where you recognize yourself”, Oppenheimer is quoted by VOA News Asia talking about The Look of Silence. And he continues, “it is where you feel: ‘Oh no! Is this what we are as human beings? Is this what we can do to each other? … Yes, it is.’”53 In a more general fashion, Errol Morris, one of the executive producers, said to the New York Times just after the movie’s first screening: “The most you can ask from art, really good art, maybe great art, is that it makes you think, it makes you ask questions, makes you wonder about how we know things, how we experience history and know who we are. And there are so many amazing moments like that here.”54 The mission-like nature of the project is fulfilled with this link to the subjective self: what would you do? Danielle Mina Dadras has argued that Congo’s success in the film is “his abil- ity to tap into our – and Oppenheimer’s – desire for recognizable narratives of cinematic redemption; that is, films that validate our deeply held belief in the power of stories and their ability to illuminate, in this case, the entanglements of history, guilt, and truth in the horror-show of post-60s Indonesia.”55 The re- demption theme is taken up by movie critics such as Henry Barnes, who, writ- ing in the Guardian, observed, “The monster who had caused misery for thou- sands was the dapper gent serving him sweet tea, playing Cliff Richard records and teaching his grandchildren to care for injured animals.” For a post–Second World War Western audience, Barnes contemplates, “It’s this dissonance that makes the film so disturbing. It forces you to relate to a mass murderer.”56 The real issue in the movie, however, is not Congo, but his accomplice Zulkad- ry, who shows no remorse, who has learned to master his ghosts through ther- apy (00:48:23–00:48:25) and who advises Congo to do the same (00:48:46). Zulkadry points to the natural way of things and bounces the question of re- sponsibility back to the audience: war crimes are defined by the winners, he argues (01:07:45). Or member of the Pemuda Pancasila Herman Koto. In the film Koto does not ask a single question about what was done. He seems to accept the grand narrative of the killers as saviours of the nation. These com- plicated perpetrators, able to keep the ghosts at a distance, are the real chal- lenge of Oppenheimer’s film. Zulkadry, too, opines that the government should apologise (00:47:00) and speaks about reconciliation (saling memanfaatkan – forgiving each other, 00:47:15). Koto is not a one-dimensional gangster but, as Oppenheimer points out, “one of the few people brave enough to hold screen- ings of the film in the city of Madiun, where we made it.”57 These complex men 53 Poulou 2016. 54 Rochter 2013. 55 Dadras 2014. 56 Barnes 2013a. 57 Prigge 2014.