In the Year of the Pig

"Pig" is not quite as narratively focused in terms of a brew of Archival political talking heads and docu-newsreels with (for then) newly shot interviews as one gets with Marcel Ophuls work, and it can't help but have some competition now in more recent years with Ken Burns and his Vietnam War epic documentary (frankly except for Hearts and Minds I'm not sure how many others would fare by comparison at such a tall order). It's one of those times with a documentary where I was never exactly lost with the information that is given, but a conventional Narrator at points would've been a boost.

Yet this is nevertheless fascinating for the scope of how this filmmaker digs into how while some of the escalations were on the Americans, but there was also rampant corruption in the governments of South Vietnam over the years as well (at least according to some of these politicians who one should take with a grain or rock of salt). All of those moments of rampant viomece and horrors in the streets of those cities are captivating, and even just that one shot of the planes dropping the multitudes of bombs has this awful elegance to it. I should also note that to have that politician say outright how clearly it was to anyone with two brain cells that going past aid to Vietnam would lead to disaster is really something else.

But most of all (of course) is the section with the Buddhist priests who march in protest and then who burned themselves alive; it's odd to think the first time I saw this was in Bergman's Persona (the only time that film references something so topical and immediate), though as I age I get it: your soul is always going to ache watching that scene, and it only becomes more harrowing and heartbreaking for all of humanity the more horrors happen throughout humankind.

In The Year of the Pig is as important to narrative cinema as it is to documentary cinema. The raw and powerful anti-Vietnam (note- De made the film in 1968 and not in the 80's or 90's like directors such as Stone or Kubrick) documentary is composed of archival footage, interviews done by De himself, and an amazing soundtrack done by a student of avant-garde composer John Cage. De first tackled didactic montage in Point of Order and he all but masters it in this film. Imagine this- war torn American soldiers, legless and bloody, being carried off the battlefield while "Old Glory" is being played on timbas and other Indonesian instruments. It is so anti-American, anti-War, and brilliant. This film is a seminal piece of work in the New American Cinema and should be preserved for generations to come.

It's not that it needed an actor to voice it, but it really would have benefitted from someone with just a little more inflexion and emotion in their voice as this archive-based documentary tries to explain to us just what the Vietnam war was all about. Beginning at the close of the era of French Indo-China, with somewhat idealistic treaties being created between the French and their former colonies, this uses quite an impressive collection of reportage to takes us through a chronology of what happens next. The end of the Vietnamese Empire, fragmentation of all things that were once under European control, the encroachment of the Chinese and/or Soviet-backed communists and, of course, the attempts of the US military to prop up a pro-western government - regardless of the methods or credentials of the people it supported. Editorially, it's quite interesting in that it at least attempts to strike a balance between those for and against on Capitol Hill. Dark forebodings from the late President Kennedy that large-scale bombings wouldn't work and would only drive the youngsters into the arms of the Viet-Kong are ignored and appear to be borne out as more tonnage is dropped on this small nation than during the entirety of the Second World War. There are some truly incongruous images here. Paddy farmers using skills passed down from their great-ancestors whilst carrying rifles; young men digging huge holes in the ground so they can shelter from the overhead onslaught. It also doesn't shy away from showing us the injuries caused to the squaddies on the ground, crawling through the dense jungle and having to fight hand-to-hand (or rifle to rifle) without the overwhelming technological superiority their country undoubtedly possessed. As the conflict entrenches, we are shown that this hitherto agrarian population is getting to grips with modern weaponry and modern combat tactics and with death tolls mounting on both sides the politicians have become just as deeply entrenched. In my own, humble, opinion what this all showed was the ultimate triumph of dogma over humanity, and a shocking disrespect for the prevailing cultures too. Did anyone really care about the indiscriminate bombings killing thousands of civilians? Were they a sacrifice both sides were prepared to make for a greater goal? The USA determined that communism couldn't get a further foothold in Asia, the Viet-Kong continuing an age-old fight for these people to be free - of Mongols, of Manchu, of French or, of Americans. The narration doesn't attempt to formulate any ideas nor does it encourage us one way or the other. The quotes from the White House, Congress, the US State Department as well as from journalist and former territorial administrators frequently contradict each other, but there is more than enough comment and imagery here for us to draw our own, quite well informed, conclusions. It's quite a testament to the courage of the camera operators and shows quite clearly that after a slew of content proving the futilities and abhorrences of WWII, some governments still think war, directed from a room thousands of miles away, can ever provide for a permanent solution.

Worth the time to revisit especially in today's money-making military-industrial complex. Colonialism & imperialism are often ugly: be prepared for disgust as this work adeptly weaves historical footage (lots of white-male talking heads) as a means to untangle the complicated mess of the Vietnam War. The approach is decidedly anti-war; the effect is certainly thought-provoking; and the visceral reactions of the work's first audiences probably speaks to the filmmaker hitting a nerve--perhaps the same nerve most humans have when confronted with such an ugly truth about themselves that hostility & denial ensue.

This is one of the finest documentaries ever made. It is essential for Americans and Europeans to view this work about our crimes and mentality upon and toward Indochina and its nations and peoples, the focus here being Viet Nam. The gathered archive footage is superb and this work in itself has languished unseen for decades now restored on DVD. Which comes with a very well written booklet essay by Douglas Kellner who illuminates the differences between how Emile de Antonio approached the subject versus the establishment media. The latter always presenting the world with that "voice of god" narrator that is entirely absent from IN THE YEAR OF THE PIG.

One word of caution, understand that the events were still going on during the making of these interviews and there was facts about goings-on inside the oval office under Eisenhower, JFK and LBJ (the film is pre NIXON admin ) that were not only not known to journalists but even Whitehouse or admin employees who were out of the particular loop. Facts that have since been revealed in declassified documents or candid confessions of top tier insiders.

This is particularly true about JFK and the blinding light of the post assassination mythology that made even down to earth journalists reluctant to attribute blame to Kennedy. So my tip is when you watch try and see through their reluctance to blame and willingness to imply and believe a wonderful world that would have been...if only on that day in Dallas...remember there was no Vietnamese conflict prior to Franco-American imperial interference in Viet Nam. It was not a Vietnamese made conflict it was an imperial one made by external hands.