The Killing Fields

I’m not a scholar of world history. History fascinates me, but I have not made it a priority to research and study what has happened in the past. When I encounter it, though, I absorb it because I do know that it is important to have a passing knowledge of the past because it can help dictate the future. We all know the phrase “Those who don’t learn from the past are doomed to repeat it.” This is proving to be true as the world seems determined to return to the days of fascism and the Third Reich. Countries like North Korea keep poking the bear, trying to stir up a war, Russia is invading Ukraine just like Germany did to Poland and France, and domestic terrorism is on the rise. It’s a scary time to be alive; scary enough to get so focused on it that we can forget that things can be so much worse than what we face in our own backyards. 

Take for instance the rise of the Khmer Rouge regime, also known as the Communist Party of Kampuchea. This was a regime that came into power in Cambodia in the early to mid-1970s, right around the time I was born. We hear a lot about Vietnam and the Korean War but not nearly as much about what was happening in Cambodia. The Killing Fields tells the story of a news reporter, a native interpreter, and a war photographer in Cambodia during the civil war. It takes a grueling look at this war-torn country, the bloody realities of that war, and how it affected the civilians who were trapped in there during all of this. In a stroke of brilliance, newcomer Haing S. Ngor, who was an actual refugee from Cambodia who escaped a forced labour camp during the war, was cast to relive atrocities he would have actually been witness to. His portrayal is so real and visceral that it carried him to an Oscar win, just the second time in Academy Awards history that a non-professional actor has won an acting Oscar. Just watching him, you can see the truth behind his eyes, and it is a harrowing portrayal. 

When the film opens, it is 1973. The Khmer Rouge (Cambodian National Army) is waging a civil war with the communist Khmer Rouge. Sydney Schanberg (Sam Waterston), a reporter for The New York Times, arrives at the airport, but his connection, interpreter Dith Pran (Haing S. Ngor), is not there to meet him. Pran was called away suddenly, and Schanberg has to take a taxi to his hotel, where he meets up with photographer Al Rockoff (John Malkovich). When Pran finally meets up with Schanberg, he informs him that an American B-52 has allegedly bombed Neak Leung, a town in the Prey Veng Province. Pran and Schanberg go to the town to confirm the bombing but are arrested when Rockoff tries to take photos of some of the Khmer Rouge operatives being executed. They are eventually released, but Schanberg is furious when the U.S. Army arrives, accompanied by the international press corps. 

Flash forward two years, and the civil war is not going well. The Phnom Penh embassies are being evacuated in anticipation of the Khmer Rouge’s arrival. Pran’s family is successfully evacuated to America but he stays behind to help Schanberg. When the Khmer Rouge arrive, it is ostensibly in peace, but Schanberg, Pran, and Rockoff, amongst others, are almost immediately arrested. Pran, because he is Cambodian, manages to prevent his friends from being executed, and they are relocated to the French embassy, where an opportunity arises to get Schanberg and Rockoff evacuated back to America. Knowing Pran may be executed, they attempt to forge a passport for him to join his family, but it fails, and he has to be left behind. 

From here, the film shifts focus primarily to Pran as he is forced to live under the totalitarian regime, hiding that he is educated to avoid being killed. Eventually, he escapes, traveling through the jungles in an attempt to reach the border to Thailand, where he can finally make it back to his family. Back in New York, Schanberg is doing what he can to locate Pran and return him to his family, but his resources are limited. He’s also being called out for not making Pran evacuate earlier when his family successfully got out. 

Any film trying to do justice to such a grizzly topic cannot shy away from the brutal violence that happened during that war. The Killing Fields makes sure that you feel the horrors of it all. We see depravity and gore aplenty as people are executed on-screen, children die, and explosions blow limbs off and leave people to bleed out. This is not an easy film to watch; you should not go into it thinking otherwise. But I would argue that this level of violence and brutality is needed to get the point across. A sanitized look at the war would not do it justice nor would it elicit the emotional response such an event needs to have. With that being said, if you cannot handle that level of real-world violence, then this film is not for you.

This film is not fast-paced, either. At nearly two and a half hours long, it feels its length. The first hour is basically Schanberg, Pran, and Rockoff going from snapping pictures to being held captive. Once the other two are evacuated, there is another hour plus of Pran hiding his education, doing manual labor, and walking through endless horrors until the final ten minutes. Those horrors are visceral and something you will never be able to forget, though, which makes them highly effective, especially when he comes across a mass grave site where the bones of hundreds of people are left in the mud, exposed to the world. This moment really cements in the level of evil that has been going on. 

As powerful as the imagery is, this was not a film that spoke to audiences at the time. It ended up losing $20 million at the box office. It fared better with critics and received seven nominations at that year’s Academy Awards, winning three. Haing S. Ngor was among those three. He was quoted as saying: “I wanted to show the world how deep starvation is in Cambodia, how many people die under the Communist regime. My heart is satisfied. I have done something perfect.” [People Magazine 1985] This film isn’t perfect, but what he did in it, and how he humanized the atrocities of those who were forced into labour camps in Cambodia under the Khmer Rouge’s regime, is perfect. His performance carries the second half of this film when it could easily collapse underneath all of the despair. It makes the journey all the more worthwhile, even as we want to look away and not see yet another innocent person shot to pieces or lying in a puddle of their own blood in the streets. 

Academy Award Nominations:

Best Picture: David Puttnam

Best Director: Roland Jaffé

Best Actor: Sam Waterston

Best Supporting Actor: Haing S. Ngor (won)

Best Screenplay - Based on Material from Another Medium: Bruce Robinson

Best Cinematography: Chris Menges (won)

Best Film Editing: Jim Clark (won)

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Release Date: November 2, 1984

Running Time: 141 Minutes

Rated R

Starring: Sam Waterston, Haing S. Ngor, Julian Sands, Craig T. Nelson, John Malkovich, and Athol Fugard

Directed By: Roland Jaffé