A Sign of Change as Indonesian Soldiers Watch ‘The Look of Silence’

Jakarta Globe, Mar 08, 2015

‘Senyap’, or ‘The Look of Silence’. (JG Photo/ Yudhi Sukma Wijaya)

Jakarta. Legislators, historians and human rights activists have hailed a local military commander’s move to have his soldiers in Semarang, Central Java, watch “The Look of Silence” by award-winning American director Joshua Oppenheimer — a documentary on the state’s purge of suspected communist sympathizers that left up to 500,000 people dead.

Maman Imanulhaq, a legislator from the National Awakening Party (PKB), said the willingness of Semarang military commander to require his men to watch the movie marked “good progress” toward creating professional soldiers with a healthy respect for human rights.

“I’m sure that some of them will not agree with the movie, but by watching it we can see that they want to try to understand,” he said. “Hopefully, if they don’t agree then they can make another movie challenging it, not use violence or ban it.”

He expressed hope that the fact that military officers had embraced rather than shunned the documentary was an indication that there might be a willingness by the authorities to look into the widespread abuses committed by the military and state-sponsored militias during the purge that ran from 1965 to 1966.

The official narrative is that the Indonesian Communist Party (PKI) sparked the whole incident by attempting a coup to take down then-president Sukarno. That story, though, has long been debunked by independent historians and rights activists as a cover for the military, led by Gen. Suharto, to stage its own ouster of Sukarno.

The military’s killing spree resulted in the deaths or disappearances of up to half a million people suspected of being members of the PKI — at the time the biggest communist party in the world after those in China and the USSR — or communist sympathizers.

Tunggal Pawestri, a right activist, welcomed the screening of “Senyap,” which looks back at the tragedy through the eyes of a relative of one of the victims, saying that could serve as a “gateway to discussion and reconciliation efforts” between the military and those it killed.

Oppenheimer, the documentary’s Oscar-nominated director, said he felt odd seeing photos of hundreds of soldiers in full uniform as if they wanted to go to war sit in front of a screen that was showing his film.

He said in a statement that the scene was surreal for him, but at the same time provided a ray of hope. He said he hoped that the well-recorded military involvement in canceling and banning the movie would not happen again.

Instead, he said, in the future the military should be actively involved in discussions and help answer questions during community events.

On the reconciliation process in Indonesia, he said that a solitary event of soldiers watching the documentary was not all that significant, considering the central government’s policy on human rights.

After half a century of impunity, Oppenheimer said he would not rush to conclude that reconciliation, a revelation of the truth, justice and rehabilitation for victims would take place just because of one screening attended by soldiers.

Bonnie Triyana, a historian, also doubted if making soldiers view the documentary would change the government’s approach to the massacre.

“This is good news. However, it’s too early to say whether it will affect the state’s policy on the 1965 killings,” he said.

Hundreds of soldiers in Semarang, attended the screening of “Look of Silence” on Feb. 26 in the headquarters of the district military command and ordered by the commander, Lt. Col. Taufik Zega.

“The screening was aimed at clarifying the intention of the documentary production, in order to avoid misunderstandings,” Central Java’s Diponegoro Military Command said on its website, although it stopped short of explaining what misunderstandings.

“The screening was part of efforts to examine facts about what actually happened in 1965, because many people have conflicting opinions in regards to what happened,” it added.

By watching the movie, soldiers were expected to be able to explain to the public the content of the movie and its connections with the Indonesian Military (TNI), when confronted about the issue, the site said.

“The Look of Silence,” which first screened last year, is a follow-up to Oppenheimer’s Oscar-nominated documentary “The Act of Killing,” released two years earlier.

While “The Act of Killing” explores the anti-communist pogrom by getting the perpetrators to re-enact their crimes, “Look of Silence” looks at the massacre through the eyes of its victims.

In 1965, Ramli was murdered as a teenager for his alleged support of the PKI. The film crew follows his brother, Adi Rukun, born 1968, as he meets and confronts Ramli’s murderers and their families.

When “The Act of Killing” was released in 2012, it was screened in secret in Indonesia, for fear of government retaliation.

“The Look of Silence,” though, premiered with a public viewing in Jakarta on Nov. 10 — National Heroes Day — last year.

Indonesia’s National Commission on Human Rights (Komnas HAM) has reaffirmed its support for the screening of the film throughout Indonesia, stating that it was a part of human rights education and national reconciliation.

Nevertheless, the movie has been met with rejection from some groups, such as the hard-line Islamic People’s Forum (FUI), whose members stormed the campus of Gadjah Mada University in Yogyakarta in December while a student organization was screening the film.

The screening of 'The Look of Silence' was held in the headquarters of the

 district military command, attended by the commander, Lt. Col. Taufik Zega,

 as well as chiefs of subdistrict military units under his supervision (Photo

courtesy of the Indonesian Military)

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