'Year of Living Dangerously' to get first RI screening
'Year of Living Dangerously' to get first RI screening
By Daniel Cooney
JAKARTA, Indonesia (AP): Banned by Indonesia's former dictator
Soeharto for graphically depicting his tumultuous and bloody rise
to power in the 1960s, the movie, The Year of Living Dangerously,
is set to be screened here for the first time.
Organizers of the city's annual film festival said last week
they planned to feature the 1983 movie next week.
Set amid rising political tensions, extreme poverty and bloody
demonstrations, many regard it as a definitive celluloid
depiction of the world's fourth most populous nation.
The story centers around the ouster of founding President
Sukarno in 1965 and the subsequent killing of hundreds of
thousands of suspected communists.
The film focuses on foreign journalists covering the turmoil.
Starring Mel Gibson, Sigourney Weaver and Linda Hunt, it is based
on a novel written by Australian author Christopher Koch.
Hunt won an Oscar for her portrayal of a cameraman with a
social conscience.
Jakarta objected to the movie even before filming started in
1983. Australian-born director Peter Weir was forced to shoot it
in Sydney and the Philippines' capital, Manila.
The head of the Jakarta International Film Festival, Natacha
Devillers, said Indonesia's formerly strict censor board had said
it would not prevent the Nov. 8 screening.
"This will be the first time it has been shown here," she
said.
"The censors have said they will not block the showing of
anything political."
Devillers said Indonesian censors had relaxed many of their
strict rules since Soeharto was forced from office in May 1998
after 32 years of autocratic rule.
Soeharto, a former army general, replaced Sukarno in 1965
after a still-unexplained mutiny by leftist army officers.
Soeharto placed Sukarno, Indonesia's founding father, under house
arrest where he died in 1970.
Current President Abdurrahman Wahid took office a year ago
promising to push through democratic reforms. One of Sukarno's
daughters, Megawati Soekarnoputri, is Vice President.
Wahid has called for greater liberalization of the
entertainment industry and encouraged an independent and critical
press. He also has called for a reappraisal of the events of
1965.
Ironically, some analysts and journalists in Indonesia have
labeled 2000 as another year of living dangerously, after a spate
of bombings and fierce sectarian and separatist clashes.