TERLENA - BREAKING OF A NATION

directed by ANDRE VILTCHEK

Indonesia, 2004, 89 minutes

Thursday January 25th, 2007 at 7 pm

Metro Cinema

Citadel Theatre Complex 9828-101A Avenue

$10.00 regular admission and $8.00 for students, seniors, members

One million - two million - maybe even three million people died in the aftermath of a 1965 military coup led by the general Suharto and supported by the West. Nobody knows the exact number; there were no records kept and no serious investigations made. Storytellers were murdered; thrown in jail, forced to exile. Manuscripts and books were burned. Film studios were closed down. Thinkers were tortured, murdered, forced to exile.

That's what happened in Indonesia after the coup that was full-heartedly supported by the West.

Until now, Indonesia remains the most "undocumented" major country on earth. Indonesia is also home to the largest Muslim population in the world. Almost no great books and studies were ever written about it. The few documentary films that were produced rely heavily on eyewitnesses from the West. One reason for this is, of course, that famous "culture of silence".

The film was shot in 2004, before the Presidential election, on several locations in Indonesia: in the capital Jakarta, in Bandung and Depok, in the ancient capital of Java - Jogyakarta and in Bali.