starring (French voice cast) Bérénice Bejo, Louis Garrel, Aude-Laurence Clermont Biver
starring (English voice cast) Kalean Ung. Joe Ngo, Erika Ishii
co-written and directed by Denis Do
87 minutes
Chou, Khuon, Souvanh (their 3-year-old son), and other relatives are forced to leave Phnom Penh when the Khmer Rouge take over Cambodia in 1975. They are forced into the countryside where they are made to work in the fields. Chou and Khuon are separated from Souvanh. They want to find him but the Khmer Rouge guards won't let them.
Chou and Khuom meet Sok, one of Khuon's cousins. Sok has joined the Khmer Rouge and is a true believer. He cuts Khoun and his relatives little slack, at first.
Khuon is eventually sent away to work in another part of the country. He is gone for years. Chou survives without him but sees other members of her extended families killed for various reasons.
Chou and Khuon are eventually reunited. They go looking for their son as the Khmer Rouge begin to lose their hold on the country.
The title of the movie is a reference to an ancient kingdom that existed for several hundred years in what is now Cambodia.
I watched the original version which was in French. Most, if not all, of the voices were done by White actors. This is not the case with the English language version where many or most of the actors have Asian sounding names.
This was not the most uplifting of movies. Most of the violence in the movie is implied rather than shown. The movie was very well made but the narrative is a bit choppy and episodic. It isn't the sort of story that pays everything off. I like the visuals and the music more than any other aspects of the movie.
I watched the movie a second time with the English voice cast. I picked up on a few things that slipped past me the first time around. The English subtitles didn't match exactly the English spoken words. I believe they were the same English subtitles that were used when I watched it with the French voice cast.
It was equally sad and moving on the second viewing as it was on the first, even though I knew what was coming and how it would turn out. I don't think anything is gained or lost by watching the movie with the English voice cast. The movie is set in Cambodia and in reality they wouldn't have been speaking either French or English.
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