In his documentary S-21: The Khmer Rouge Killing Machine (2003) film director Rithy Panh probed the massive genocide in Cambodia from 1975 to 1979 conducted by Pol Pot in which two million people died. This horrific slaughter of men, women, and children left Panh as the only survivor in his family. The Missing Picture is an up-close and personal documentary about his suffering and survival. With nostalgia for the faraway past, Panh depicts life before the Khmer Rouge arrived: a time where people gathered in community get-togethers in Phnom Penh.

The writer and director has chosen to depict Pol Pot's reign of terror through a series of miniature dioramas with hand-carved clay figures intermixed with propaganda films created by the regime to celebrate the re-education campaign designed to wipe out any vestiges of class or individualism among those imprisoned in labor camps. The sadness on the faces of the figurines conveys the misery and shock of the Cambodian people. The first-person voiceover is very effective in helping us to feel in our bones what Rithy Panh went through.

The Missing Picture was honored with the top Un Certain Regard prize at the 2013 Cannes Film Festival.


Screened at The 51st New York Film Festival, Lincoln Center, 2013.