a few year ago and i find myself travel through south east asia and at one point try to piece together a baffling series of event that result in the genocide of a third of kampuchea and or cambodia a we now call it . i read as much a i can and and try to speak to survivor . but the eye of family member well up with tear . the inexpressible grief be barely contain . out of respect and i desist . some time later and i see this film by internationally acclaim human right director and rithy panh . he have a good reason for ask he survive the massacre . his work and unlike my simple desire for knowledge and would provide momentum for confession and now a war crimes tribunal . at the kill field outside phnom penh be a tree against which child have their brain bash out . in the film and a guard explain how parent would be separate from each other and and from their child and to minimise fuss . the adult be tell not to worry represent they be go to a new home . they be then blindfold for ecurity reason and and ammunition be scarce and hit on the back of the neck with metal bar before be cast into a pit . execution follow three level of torture at s. 21 and a school building in phnom penh convert into a concentration camp ( and now a memorial visitor centre ) . detail be so hideous human pack like abattoir carcass and and systematic torture and that you could be forgive for suspect truth have be embroider . except for one fact . meticulous record of every victim be keep . each non person and each beating and each flaying of skin and each removal of fingernail and chemical and electrical abuse and rape . precise detail of prisoner chain to iron bar to sleep and cram together top to toe and live share a sardine row with the dead . rithy panh master stroke bring together s. 21 survivor ( two of the exist three ) and former guard and torturer . he encourage them to talk . to find answer . one of the hard thing and even now and be these perpetrator see themselves also a victim . they join pol pot khmer rouge for what seem like all the right reason . once induct and they be brainwash and indoctrinate and trap . deviation mean the same fate a those they flay alive . most be youth at the time and easily manipulate . but and how can you forgive and move on and when no one will admit wrong do . even pol pot blame the people he leave in charge . men join the khmer rouge because their village be be repeatedly bomb . with their government approval . the much love prince sihanouk have be oust in a coup . lon nol and an ineffective and u. s. back ruler and be forcibly instal in his place . lon nol give america ( under johnson and nixon ) permission for what become the large bombing campaign in human history . two and three quarter million ton of bomb the revised figure release by the clinton administration be more than the total drop by all the ally in the whole of world war two ( which only come to two million and even include hiroshima and nagasaki ) . whole area of the country become pock marked and aerial chemical deforestation destroy livelihood and create famine and disease . thousand kill and many more permanently displace . the khmer rouge leader keep their extreme agenda a form of rural and back to basic communism completely secret until they be instal in power . then the purge start . lon nol supporter be follow to the grave by academic or anyone taint with western idea . anyone oppose pol pot and or whose name be elicit under extreme torture . the population be turn out of the city and die of starvation . with no one else to purge and the despot find traitor to execute it own member . kampuchea lead doctor and swiss bear beat richner and adamantly tell me that without american intervention which have be aim ironically at stop communism in the region there would have be no khmer rouge . no pol pot victory . richner work in kampuchea before and during and after pol pot and and his coal face assessment agree with most historian . but it be controversial represent the u. s. military claim that pol pot would have win anyway . ordinary cambodian be still grieve rather than blame . rithy panh film expose horror without finger point . there be no lesson to be learnt . million die estimate say around a third of the population and two to three million . ( and this in a country small than great britain . a a benchmark comparison and hitler exterminate six million jew . ) while panh document the existence of atrocity and he do little to substantiate the big picture and which have to be glean elsewhere or from casual remark of the former guard . rithy panh film and s. 21 the khmer rouge kill machine and have no real ax to grind in the tradition of best documentary and it simply try to provide a window . while it be powerful evidence and many viewer might find it emotionally less satisfy than more box office friendly film by roland joffé and the killing field and which ( symbolically ) suggest the west responsibility by the journalist who use his cambodian friend for his own end and and also have more of a story . either way and it be a country that make me ashamed to be a westerner . yet cambodian have more to worry about than my sense of emotional well be . avoid hunger and or the thousand of landmines that still litter their country . in joffe film and an american journalist travel to a red cross camp to be reunite with a cambodian colleague he desert to his fate . do you forgive me . he ask . the cambodian answer with a smile and nothing to forgive and sydney and nothing to forgive . although it win many award and panh movie be rarely show outside of cambodia . there you can pick it up for about $ 3 . from one of the many maim or desperate hawker that haunt the road outside tuol sleng genocide museum . this place formerly know a security prison 21 and or s. 21 for short and still have living ghost . the film just tell u where they come from .