"The Killing Fields" Still Topical 27 Years Later

"They brought in the entire press core. The want to sanitize the story!" Sydney Schanberg says in The Killing Fields as the U.S Army brings in the international press score to report on the accidental bombing of Neak Leung.

The statement gets to the heart of what The Killing Fields is about, culpability for horrors committed during the Cambodian conflict -- who tries to hide from that, and who stands up. It's a dramatized version of experiences documented by the film's three main characters and real-life journalists: Dith Pran, Sydney Schanberg and Jon Swain. It explores the rule of the Khmer Rouge, the damage caused to Cambodia, and the execution of many citizens.

It also reveals the crisis of conscience Westerners faced about whether their own involvement aided or exacerbated the Cambodian Holocaust in light of news about Western governments (specifically the US) secretly partnering the Khmer Rouge. After Schanberg returns home, his writing on the Cambodian conflict earns awards. When he's then accused of keeping his friend and colleague, Cambodian reporter Dith Pran, in the country to further his story, Schanberg battles with guilt. He eventually admits that he does feel responsible for Pran staying in Cambodia without his family, struggling to reconcile his role in Pran's disappearance through the end of the film. He may not have acted maliciously, but he believes his presence did nothing to help Pran either.

Though The Killing Fields was released in 1984, the relevance of the movie and the Khmer Rouge's reign persists. Cambodia's citizens may no longer experience routine attacks from the Khmer Rouge, but even the last of the regime's leaders evaded capture until as recently as 1999. And it's impossible to forget the lives and communities destroyed during the 1970s, with a death toll estimated at over 1.5 million victims.

Today, the Khmer Rouge trials continue. Regime leaders are being brought up on charges of genocide and crimes against humanity long after the effects have rippled through various cultures. In 2007, Vanguard's Kaj Larsen brought to light a disturbing connection between Khmer Rouge torture techniques and waterboarding, a hot-button issue in the US driving the debate about proper interrogation methods during wartime.

"All of a sudden I had this epiphany," Kaj Larsen says, recalling his visit to Tuol Sleng Genocide Museum in Cambodia. There, he saw pictures of Cambodian prisoners being waterboarded by the Khmer Rouge. "We are practicing the same technique that this genocidal regime practiced."
 
The revelation echoes some of the themes and questions raised in The Killing Fields. Have we let ourselves believed in a "sanitized" version of the story, assuming Western nations aren't affected? Although the immediacy of the genocide of the Cambodian people may have passed, even more recent discoveries indicate that multiple nations may have been influenced by that history, left to determine their role in and responsibility for the aftermath.