Film
First They Killed My Father (film)
First They Killed My Father is a 2017 Khmer-language feature film directed by Angelina Jolie, adapted from Loung Ung's memoir of the same name.[1] It follows a young girl's survival under the Khmer Rouge, seen through her eyes.[1][2]
Synopsis
The story begins in 1975. Loung is five years old, one of seven children of a government official, and her family lives comfortably in Phnom Penh.[3] When the Khmer Rouge take the city and empty it, the family is forced into the countryside.[2] They hide as ordinary working people to escape persecution.[3] Her father is taken away.[4] Her mother sends Loung and her siblings Kim and Chou away to pose as orphans.[2][5]
Loung is trained as a child soldier and taught to lay mines.[3] When Vietnamese troops invade, she flees through a minefield she had helped lay.[4] At a refugee camp she is reunited with two of her siblings, and later with two of their brothers.[4] The film ends with the five of them praying for their lost relatives in a Buddhist temple.[4]
The story covers Loung's life from age five to nine.[6] Its synopsis on Rotten Tomatoes puts the number of Cambodians who died under the Khmer Rouge at nearly two million, and the Palm Springs International Film Festival gives more than two million.[7][8]
Production and credits
Jolie and Loung Ung wrote the screenplay, and Jolie produced the film with Rithy Panh.[9][4] Loung Ung, Maddox Jolie-Pitt, Adam Somner, Michael Vieira and Charles Schissel were executive producers.[9] Anthony Dod Mantle was the cinematographer, Xavier Box and Patricia Rommel edited the film, and Marco Beltrami composed the music.[8] Bophana Production, Jolie Pas Productions and Netflix produced it.[10][11]
The film was made in Cambodia with a Cambodian cast and crew and shot in Khmer.[2] Some of the crew had lived through the war themselves. Therapists were on set when the production recreated the violence of those years.[2] To show the world from a five-year-old's point of view, crew members walked on their knees to learn what a child could see and reach.[2]
Cast
- Sareum Srey Moch as Loung Ung
- Phoeung Kompheak as Pa Ung
- Sveng Socheata as Ma Ung
- Mun Kimhak as Kim
- Run Malyna as Chou
- Oun Srey Neang as Keav
- Heng Dara as Meng
- Khoun Sothea as Khouy
- Sarun Nika as Geak
- Tharoth Sam as the child soldier leader
- Reth Tiger as a Khmer Rouge soldier
Loung Ung appears as herself.[5][10]
Release and reception
Its U.S. premiere was at the Telluride Film Festival, and it also screened at the Toronto International Film Festival.[12][13] It opened in Cambodian cinemas on September 8, 2017, on 23 screens in Phnom Penh and Siem Reap.[12] Netflix released it worldwide on September 15, 2017.[9][13] It also opened in a limited theatrical release that day.[3] The film was an official selection of the 2017 Cambodia Town Film Festival in Long Beach, California. It screened on September 16, 2017, at the Art Theatre Long Beach, followed by a question-and-answer session with Loung Ung, the film's writer and executive producer.[6]
On Rotten Tomatoes the film has an approval rating of 88 percent from 74 reviews, and on Metacritic a score of 72 out of 100 from 22 critics.[7][14] Tara Brady of The Irish Times called Jolie "an exquisite craftswoman."[7]
Cambodia chose the film as its entry for Best Foreign Language Film at the 90th Academy Awards; it was not nominated.[13][15]
Awards and nominations include:
- Nomination, BAFTA Award for Best Film Not in the English Language (2018)
- Nomination, Golden Globe Award for Best Foreign Language Film[8]
- Nominations for best foreign-language film from the Critics' Choice, Online Film Critics Society, Satellite and Women's Image Network awards
- Bronze Frog at Camerimage for Anthony Dod Mantle (November 2017)
- Hollywood Foreign Language Film Award for Jolie and Loung Ung (November 5, 2017)
- National Board of Review Freedom of Expression Award (November 28, 2017), shared with Let It Fall: Los Angeles 1982-1992[16][17]
Related works
The film adapts First They Killed My Father: A Daughter of Cambodia Remembers, Loung Ung's 2000 account of her childhood under the Khmer Rouge.[1][2][3]
Watch
References
- ↑ 1.0 1.1 1.2 Netflix, First They Killed My Father
- ↑ 2.0 2.1 2.2 2.3 2.4 2.5 2.6 NPR, 'This Is Their Film': Angelina Jolie Tells A Story Of Khmer Rouge Survival (September 13, 2017)
- ↑ 3.0 3.1 3.2 3.3 3.4 The Atlantic, 'First They Killed My Father' Is a Surprising, Devastating Triumph (September 2017)
- ↑ 4.0 4.1 4.2 4.3 4.4 Heinrich Böll Stiftung Cambodia, Timothy Williams, Film Review: First They Killed My Father: A Daughter of Cambodia Remembers (June 27, 2018)
- ↑ 5.0 5.1 Wikipedia, First They Killed My Father (film)
- ↑ 6.0 6.1 Cambodia Town Film Festival, CTFF 2017 Official Selection: FIRST THEY KILLED MY FATHER (archived)
- ↑ 7.0 7.1 7.2 Rotten Tomatoes, First They Killed My Father
- ↑ 8.0 8.1 8.2 Palm Springs International Film Festival, First They Killed My Father (2018)
- ↑ 9.0 9.1 9.2 /Film, Hoai-Tran Bui, 'First They Killed My Father' Trailer: The Harrowing Memoir Is Brought To Netflix By Angelina Jolie (August 2, 2017)
- ↑ 10.0 10.1 IMDb, First They Killed My Father (2017)
- ↑ Cambodia Film Commission, First They Killed My Father
- ↑ 12.0 12.1 The Hollywood Reporter, Patrick Brzeski, Angelina Jolie's 'First They Killed My Father' Boosts Oscar Eligibility With Release in Cambodia (September 8, 2017)
- ↑ 13.0 13.1 13.2 TheWrap, Steve Pond, Angelina Jolie Joins Oscar Foreign-Language Race as Entries Near 50 (September 18, 2017)
- ↑ Metacritic, First They Killed My Father (undated; read October 9, 2026)
- ↑ Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences, The 90th Academy Awards, 2018 (undated)
- ↑ National Board of Review, 2017 award year (undated)
- ↑ The Film Stage, Jordan Raup, The Post Named Best Film, Greta Gerwig Gets Best Director: 2017 National Board of Review Winners (November 28, 2017)