Plot
In 1985, Pol Pot is on a slow retreat; he's in Cambodia's Battembang Region. Four men hide in a darkened room. Pol Pot enters with his deputy, security chief, and a general. The four men in hiding, without conviction, say "Surprise." A banner says "Happy birthday." A cake and candles appear; the four sing "Happy Birthday" without spirit. The intern is given a piece of cake to taste for poison. Then, all are served a slice. A few presents appear: the deputy unwraps a neck support pillow, a book about management, and a decorative stand reading, "Don't ask me I just work here." The leader wants all to get back to work, but an aide brings one more gift: a puppy. A good gift?
Keywords: birthday-party, dictator, pol-pot, surprise-party
Plot
Using an often surprising manic and fractured style, the film "Liden Tid" (Time Is But Brief), is exploring the visionary possibilities of systematic disorientation of the viewer's senses. Yet, the filmmaker skillfully manages to take the audience through a gut wrenching, nightmarishly absurd tale of a young man, whose life has gotten out of control. The contradiction of relentless desire vs. ultimate destruction taking over the main character's life is summed up in scenes, where a strangely detached American philosopher is spewing dead-on truths about life and death. With a reckless, somewhat sinister distance and dark humor, the director (Anders Bramsen) gives us an unposed picture of a soul, yearning for freedom, and raises the question of what's left when humans are incapable of, or unwilling to live life on life's terms.
Man against himself
Saloth Sar (19 May 1925 – 15 April 1998), better known as Pol Pot (Khmer: ប៉ុល ពត), was a Cambodian Maoist revolutionary who led the Khmer Rouge from 1963 until his death in 1998. From 1963 to 1981, he served as the General Secretary of the Communist Party of Kampuchea. From 1976 to 1979, he also served as the prime minister of Democratic Kampuchea. Pol Pot became leader of Cambodia on April 17, 1975. During his time in power he imposed agrarian socialism, forcing urban dwellers to relocate to the countryside to work in collective farms and forced labor projects. The combined effects of forced labor, malnutrition, poor medical care, and executions resulted in the deaths of approximately 21% of the Cambodian population. In all, an estimated 1.7 to 2.5 million people (out of a population of slightly over 8 million) died as a result of the policies of his three-year premiership.
In 1979, after the Vietnamese invasion of Cambodia, Pol Pot fled to the jungles of southwest Cambodia, and the Khmer Rouge government collapsed. From 1979 to 1997, he and a remnant of the old Khmer Rouge operated near the border of Cambodia and Thailand, where they clung to power, with nominal United Nations recognition as the rightful government of Cambodia. Pol Pot died in 1998 while under house arrest by the Ta Mok faction of the Khmer Rouge. Since his death, rumours that he was poisoned have persisted.
Saddam Hussein Abd al-Majid al-Tikriti (Arabic: صدام حسين عبد المجيد التكريتي Ṣaddām Ḥusayn ʿAbd al-Maǧīd al-Tikrītī; 28 April 1937 – 30 December 2006) was the fifth President of Iraq, serving in this capacity from 16 July 1979 until 9 April 2003. A leading member of the revolutionary Arab Socialist Ba'ath Party, and later, the Baghdad-based Ba'ath Party and its regional organisation Ba'ath Party – Iraq Region, which espoused ba'athism, a mix of Arab nationalism and Arab socialism, Saddam played a key role in the 1968 coup, later referred to as the 17 July Revolution, that brought the party to long-term power of Iraq.
As vice president under the ailing General Ahmed Hassan al-Bakr, and at a time when many groups were considered capable of overthrowing the government, Saddam created security forces through which he tightly controlled conflict between the government and the armed forces. In the early 1970s, Saddam nationalized oil and other industries. The state-owned banks were put under his control, leaving the system eventually insolvent mostly due to the Iran–Iraq War, the Gulf War, and UN sanctions. Through the 1970s, Saddam cemented his authority over the apparatuses of government as oil money helped Iraq's economy to grow at a rapid pace. Positions of power in the country were filled with Sunnis, a minority that made up only a fifth of the population.
"The Man" is a slang phrase that may refer to the government or to some other authority in a position of power. In addition to this derogatory connotation, it may also serve as a term of respect and praise.
The phrase "the Man is keeping me down" is commonly used to describe oppression. The phrase "stick it to the Man" encourages resistance to authority, and essentially means "fight back" or "resist", either openly or via sabotage.
The earliest recorded use[citation needed] of the term "the Man" in the American sense dates back to a letter written by a young Alexander Hamilton in September 1772, when he was 15. In a letter to his father James Hamilton, published in the Royal Dutch-American Gazette, he described the response of the Dutch governor of St. Croix to a hurricane that raked that island on August 31, 1772. "Our General has issued several very salutary and humane regulations and both in his publick and private measures, has shewn himself the Man." [dubious – discuss] In the Southern U.S. states, the phrase came to be applied to any man or any group in a position of authority, or to authority in the abstract. From about the 1950s the phrase was also an underworld code word for police, the warden of a prison or other law enforcement or penal authorities.
A return to the land.
Primitive way of life.
Internet is outlawed.
Sort the wheat from the chaff, shrink the population,
dig your hole in the ground.
To keep you is no benefit.
To destroy you is no loss.
Shrink the population, dig your hole in the ground.
Sort the wheat from the chaff, shrink the population,
dig your hole in the ground.
Mustn't waste the bullets.
Kill with other methods.
Bury them together.
Purify the nation.
Stamp out useless learning.
Facilitate the system.