Congo 'vomiting' at the end

I'm glad you brought that up. It would be nice to think it was a spontaneous and unaffected display of catharsis, something that indicated that Congo was suffering for all his ill deeds. I think he wanted to suggest that, and I would be disappointed if he had been primed somehow. I don't think the director would do that, but as with much research, 'participants' often get a lot of cues about what sort of behaviour they should engage in (demand characteristics).

Some of it may have been genuine though. Returning to a spot where you killed maybe dozens of people is likely to have some kind of effect on your state of mind, particularly if (as above) you feel like it should have some kind of effect and that that should involve some kind of display of emotion.

Its a strange, strange scene though. Its almost as though he was engaging in an exorcism, a casting out of demons, or more cynically trying to create that effect

The scene is inherently ambiguous and I think that's what makes it so powerful. I hope people don't watch it and think of it as necessarily some kind of cathartic moment where Congo realizes all his bad deeds. You should hear Errol Morris describe that scene here, starts at about the 9 minutes 50 seconds.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LLQxVy7R9qo

I've read some interesting interpretations of that scene and his behavior throughout. Here is a guy that proclaims he got a lot of his killing method influence from watching movies. Knowing he's become a focal point for this movie, I imagine he's also seen movies centered around characters that suffer the consequences of their ruthless past. Is he really a man that has realized his unredeemable qualities or acting like one for the sake of the film? Definitely ambiguous which makes discussing it worthwhile.

I thought all the Indonesian people shown, excepting the poor Chinese people who still have to pay these extortionists, were monsters. I've never been to Indonesia and I never will. Awful place if North Sumatra is anything to go by. Pity the komodo dragons haven't eaten them.

HOWEVER, the only saving grace in this film was Anwar Congo. I thought it clear that his bewilderment at his feelings and wondering if they were like those of his victims was sincere. The violent physical reaction he had at the end seemed to me to be the trauma in his body. In spite of all his swagger I don't believe he was able to suppress the trauma at killing so many people. Killing them in the name of communism but actually it looked like plain racism to me.

I agree that's it's terrible he'll never be held accountable but what's worse is the political pleasure some of the current Indonesians take from this history and the rest seemed to be apathetic and willing to be bought for a high price.

I give my respect to those who have earned it; to everyone else, I'm civil.

I feel the scene is completely staged. I'm amazed that in all of these posts no one has mentioned the obvious - he has white hair again in this scene. That means it was shot early on, before they had even filmed the movie within the documentary because he died his hair black for that. And his hair was black in the scene right before the end where he is watching the footage of himself being "tortured" and perhaps has a real moment of empathy.

To then cut to a scene where he has white hair, AND goes into a brief explanation of how the wire is an efficient way to kill someone - a topic he had already covered multiple times in the doc and which had just been simulated in the scene right before this - all points to this "final" scene being shot very early on. That would mean most of the scenes of him with dark hair bragging about how he killed people were shot after this supposed epiphany of his.

And no, it would make no sense for him to die his hair back to white at the end, and it would take many months for his white hair to grow back in with no trace of the black dye left in it.


"My name is Paikea Apirana, and I come from a long line of chiefs stretching all the way back to the Whale Rider."

I believed him.