by khmerbird on June 17, 2009
Pol Pot and Khmer Rouge Leaders in a train
as i mentioned in my previous post last week about Trails From The East, a Tv program of Australia Network, this week is about the train in Cambodia.
the title of the documentary is a bit scary, does Cambodia is really a scare country? maybe it’s true for sometime in the past, but a lot of things changed … Cambodia is on its way to welcome tourists and give them various leisure and safety trip.
not yet for the railroad, but i heard the Australian company TOOL have been selected for the railroad rebuild between Phnom Penh-Poipet and Phnom Penh-Sihanoukville. more information available at Cambodge Soir,
today no more train but recently a concert and party have been organized to keep people not to forget about the train station that if you used to go to Lyon, you might see how similar style they could make between Gare de Phnom Penh and Gare de Lyon…
On June 5, the Elsewhere party has taking place, i didn’t have chance to join but you can catch up some photo at Asian Life Guide Cambodia
the Khmer-French local band Mekong Pirates, has started to chill up the place, woke up all the train station employees, the beggars, the homeless people who using station as their home right now … and the dead trains themselves.
not only the people that work and live at the station, many people: experts, local Khmers, and others baranges (white people) joined and supported the events at that night… it was a really good action to recall the intervention from the authority.
the Cambodian railroad got a lot of history, i used to see Pol Pot sitting in a train somewhere and i have contact Documentation Center of Cambodia (DC-CAM), and got the reply quickly from Youk CHHANG and Sopheak SIM, thank a lot to them for the original photo
so hope you don’t miss the real documentary about the train in Cambodia tonight, here is the schedule details:
Australia Network TV
Cambodia – Country of Scars
Wednesday, 17 June 2009 at 19:00
Cambodia – Country of Scars
Wednesday, 17 June 2009 at 22:00
Cambodia – Country of Scars
Thursday, 18 June 2009 at 12:00
by khmerbird on June 18, 2008
It’s almost 10 years now that the National Theater was burnt, but some people remains living there. Sometime they train and play on the burnt scene, sometime they discuss about their memories in Pol Pot regime. Sometime they complain why no one come and help to rebuild this burn theater? And after all, they separate to do their living: some acts in Karaoke, some becomes the motor taxi and some stay home due to their illness.
The Artist is like a fishing man. However he tried to catch many fishes, if there’s no market, the fishes will die and useless.
There’s no future for those artists, their life just go on day by day in that burnt theater. There is one artist who dares not to face to his wife since many years. He got nothing for her. If he’s about to return home, what could he bring her? There’s nothing, absolutely nothing but an empty suitcase.
Why not become someone else? Why they still stay and attach to that burnt theater? It’s because it’s not them who chose to become an artist, but the art and passion that choose them.
Once time being an artist, we will be an article for the whole life. Nobody can change.
It’s the first documentary that I like the most about Rithy Pahn. It’s not always the case study like S-21 or Rice people or an evening after the war. It’s mixed between real and fiction, he allow the artists play comedies and jokes. In a film it’s like a circumstance or a moment to remember, there’s always some joy and sadness. Life is something about the same thing. Or maybe I know noting about how to make a documentary film. But personally I wish to see something happier about Cambodia.
Synopsis
Cambodia is a land of broken dreams. There is no more cinema, no more theatre, no more playhouses. The traditional performing arts are becoming extinct, wiped out by television. But there are still artists. Trustees of a tradition which they cannot hand down for lack of institutions, financial backing and places to perform, they are doomed to live in poverty or else perform ethnic entertainments for tourists. The idea at the heart of this film is to gather a group of actors around a project that exemplifies the reality we live in: something inside us – dignity, identity – is rotting to shreds. We are in the process of losing our memory.
Title: The Burnt Theater
Running Time: 86 Minutes
Country: France, Cambodia
Genre: Documentary
Cast : Bopha Chheng, Than Nan Doeun, Peng Phan
Director – Rithy Pahn
Producer – Catherine Dussart
Editor – Marie-Christine Rougerie
Composer (Music Score) – Marc Marder
Screenwriter – Rithy Panh
The DVD is not yet available, but you can find other works from Rithy Panh. Be careful, it’s only for now available for Zone 2, Europe Only !
