With inarguably the most important film released this year, out director Joshua Oppenheimer lays bare the emotional and moral reverberations of violence in a way no documentarian has ever done before. Interviews with several men who were leaders of death squads in Indonesia during the 1960s civil unrest become recreations of the hundreds of murders they committed, with these now old men playing themselves and sometimes their victims in dreamy, nightmarish homages to noir films, westerns and musicals. Nearly 50 years after their crimes, these men confront their actions and both the selfish justifications and sudden guilt are unnerving to watch. Four months after seeing the film, I am still haunted by it. It was named the Best Documentary of 2013 by the San Diego Film Critics Society, as well as by most of the other critics in the world.
