The sound of knocking echoed through the dim room as the audience sat in silence, staring at the black screen and the last few headlights. It felt crowded, but somehow oddly isolating, like everyone was watching alone. Then the lights finally went out, and the room was wrapped in silence for about an hour and a half. That period somehow felt both quicker and longer than you would expect, until everything faded to black.

The film opens with Adi’s father singing, but you can only hear his voice—no image, just his sound, filling the space. Joshua Oppenheimer’s name appeared as the director, but there was something off: the co-producer, camera operator, assistant director, and most of the crew were listed as Anonymous. The credits slowly scrolled up and out of view. No one in the audience moved. Everyone just sat there quietly, still listening to Adi’s father’s voice.

By the end, everyone walked out of the theater feeling both connected and strangely alone, like something had hollowed them out inside.

The Look of Silence is a companion to The Act of Killing, which got an Oscar nomination in 2012. This documentary gives a chilling glimpse into how the U.S. supported Indonesia’s genocide. Many of the people behind the killings are still in power, treated like heroes, proudly bragging about the murders they carried out. They even reenact their brutal acts in full detail for Oppenheimer and the audience: beheadings, torture, strangling, it is all there.

The first film tries to make sense of why people admire these killers. Are they even capable of remorse? The Look of Silence shifts the focus to the survivors and the victims’ families. It gives their silence a sound while the camera follows Adi, whose brother Ramli was murdered by a paramilitary group two years before Adi was born. With Oppenheimer’s help, Adi finally confronts the man who killed his brother. The film also exposes the invisible weight still haunting the lives of those who lost loved ones to the violence.

It highlights how dangerous it is to search for truth and healing in a country that still defends cruelty and clings to a legacy built on lies.

At one point, Adi asks his mother how she feels, living so close to the place where she saw Ramli kidnapped and massacred during the 1965 bloodshed. Ramli had made it home after being tortured, his intestines hanging out. Terrified for his life, she hid him in the house. However, the next day, the army came in a car, saying they were taking Ramli to the hospital. That was the last time she ever saw him.

Adi is the son of a couple from East Java who live in Deli Serdang, North Sumatra. Decades after the tragedy, he decides to confront the people involved in the killings of Gerwani members and PKI (Indonesian Communist Party) sympathizers. He represents one of many families who lost loved ones in the 1965 massacre. Driven by a need for truth, Adi keeps digging into the past and trying to understand how such could have happened, and why.

Oppenheimer’s The Look of Silence builds its story around the quiet power of a knock. Compared to The Act of Killing, this film has a more emotional visual language and a stronger narrative arc. One of the most gripping moments is a tense, short exchange between Adi and the men who killed his brother. The anger, sadness, and quiet disappointment on Adi’s face lock the audience in. You cannot look away.

In one scene, an elementary school teacher stands before his students explaining the events of September 1965, linking communism to atheism. He calls PKI members “cruel and inhumane,” using dramatic effects and gruesome stories, like how the killers gouged out people’s eyes. It is a chilling example of how state narratives are passed down through schools, something many viewers may recognize from their own experience.

In another moment, Adi says to one of the perpetrators, “You killed innocent people.” The man replies, “I don’t want to talk about politics.” Adi pushes further: “You tortured and massacred my family.” The man snaps back, “You ask too many questions.”

As viewers, we find ourselves waiting for some apology, or at least acknowledgment, from people who remain blind to the horror they caused, directly or indirectly. However, instead, we get arrogance and silence, which only deepens the sense of injustice. Adi grew up in the village surrounded by the aftermath. He did not witness the killings himself, but he learned what happened to Ramli from his mother. Moreover, through Oppenheimer’s camera, as Adi speaks to the perpetrators, the audience learns the truth right alongside him.

In one quiet, powerful shot, Adi sits alone in an empty room, facing an old TV, watching a 1967 NBC News segment. On-screen, an Indonesian man tells an American journalist how beautiful the country became after the communists were “cleansed.” The moment is haunting, watching propaganda echo across generations.

Adi also watches as two older men cheerfully reenact how they used to castrate people, drag their victims through fields, and dump the bodies into the river. However, the most gripping moment for the audience comes when Adi sits face-to-face with the man who killed his brother in real life. During these encounters, he bravely confronts them, holding them accountable for what they did.

One of the men claims he used to be a headhunter who threatened Chinese business owners. Others admit to drinking their victims’ blood, believing it was the only way to avoid going insane. Inong, the leader of a death squad, even describes the taste of the blood as “salty and sweet.” When Adi asks him to explain what he means, Inong repeats it, just as chilling the second time.

In another scene, a middle-aged man wearing a black cap and jacket walks with Adi toward the site of Ramli’s murder. He had managed to escape during the executions at Snake River and now shows Adi exactly where Ramli was tortured. He remembers how Ramli screamed for help, fully aware they were all going to die. This man had fled to a palm oil plantation and survived, one of the few living witnesses to the horror inflicted on both him and Ramli.

He tells Adi he has closed that painful chapter of his life. He does not want to dig it up again or get into trouble, not even for the sake of telling the truth.

In The Look of Silence, the sounds of knocking become a quiet but powerful thread running through everything. Oppenheimer encourages Adi to gather stories from the killers, not by simply clearing a safe path, but by trying to win the trust of the paramilitary groups and their leaders. By talking to dozens of them, Oppenheimer starts to see their revisionism not just as denial, but as part of a shared, willful ignorance. To Adi, these men offer up memories that are bitter and rotten, wrapped in the sweet, triumphant language of state-approved history.

The film looks closely at the lies told by both sides, the perpetrators and the victims, lies that have lasted for decades, mostly as a way to survive. The Look of Silence leaves you feeling a mix of disbelief, disgust, and horror, but also deep respect for Adi and his quiet strength.

The audience may feel emotionally numb at times, but the focus never strays from Adi. Even when facing the people responsible for his brother’s death, he never raises his voice. His courage is so striking that when he tells his family he is meeting with leaders of the Komando Aksi death squad, they are terrified. His wife begs him to be careful. His mother urges him to bring a bat or a knife, and then adds, “Tell them you’re fasting,” warning him not to drink anything they offer in a cup.

Oppenheimer adds a personal layer to the film by showing the everyday life of Adi’s aging parents. Early on, there is a scene where Adi’s mother bathes his father, who is senile and needs help moving because of his age. When asked how old he is, Adi’s father, who is hard of hearing, says he is 16. His fading presence and his wife’s resilience give The Look of Silence a strange feel, like something out of fiction. However, this only adds more emotional weight to the story, pulling the audience in even deeper.

The film’s themes touch on global ideas of complicity and silence. In one scene, a perpetrator casually says that the U.S. government should have given him a trip to America as a reward for killing communists. To him, it was simple: if America hates communists, the rest of the world should too. By bringing the horror so close, Oppenheimer draws a line between Indonesia’s genocide and America’s violent past, especially in the slaughter of Native Americans. It reflects on how America has been involved in historical and current atrocities.

Compared to The Act of Killing, The Look of Silence is grounded, gentler in tone, and direct. Like the first film, it does not hold back when challenging the New Order regime’s control over the narrative of 1965. Oppenheimer interviews perpetrators who openly talk about their involvement in the killings, proudly describing how they murdered people accused of being “communist sympathizers.” The film also drives home a crucial point: no one is above or beyond violence. Both victims and perpetrators were just regular people.

The story unfolds like a quiet history lesson, with the ever-present sound of knocking, soft but heavy, leaving the audience unsettled. It makes you think hard about what really happened in 1965, and how the official version of history is still full of holes. The film reminds us that until those gaps are acknowledged, the past will not stay buried.

Nothing will change if people stay silent, pretend not to know, or choose ignorance. Even though the Indonesian government has officially recognized the genocide, The Look of Silence has reached over 3,500 screenings and touched more than 300,000 viewers across Indonesia. Many of them might even be relatives of the killers. However, the film offers hope. It shows that healing is possible and that new generations can step out of the shadows of their parents’ crimes.

The film is political. However, it does not beg for sympathy or rely on long speeches. Like The Act of Killing, it lets cinema do what cinema does best. Through Oppenheimer and Adi’s quiet persistence, the film uncovers deep truths about human nature, bringing forward powerful questions about honesty, guilt, and the grace it takes to face the past.

References

  • Cribb, R. (Ed.). (1990). The Indonesian Killings 1965–1966: Studies from Java and Bali. Monash University Press.
  • Heryanto, A. (2006). State Terrorism and Political Identity in Indonesia: Fatally Belonging. Routledge.
  • Oppenheimer, J. (Director). (2012). The Act of Killing [Film]. Final Cut for Real.
  • Oppenheimer, J. (Director). (2014). The Look of Silence [Film]. Final Cut for Real.
  • Roosa, J. (2006). Pretext for Mass Murder: The September 30th Movement and Suharto’s Coup d’état in Indonesia. University of Wisconsin Press.
  • Simpson, B. R. (2008). Economists with Guns: Authoritarian Development and U.S.-Indonesian Relations, 1960–1968. Stanford University Press.