The Elimination: A Survivor of the Khmer Rouge Confronts his Past and the Commandant of the Killing Fields

From the internationally acclaimed director of The Khmer Rouge Killing Machine , a survivor’s autobiography that confronts the evils of the Khmer Rouge dictatorship

Rithy Panh was only thirteen years old when the Khmer Rouge expelled his family from Phnom Penh in 1975. In the months and years that followed, his entire family was executed, starved, or worked to death. Thirty years later, after having become a respected filmmaker, Rithy Panh decides to question one of the men principally responsible for the genocide, Comrade Duch, who’s neither an ordinary person nor a demon—he’s an educated organizer, a slaughterer who talks, forgets, lies, explains, and works on his legacy. This confrontation unfolds into an exceptional narrative of human history and an examination of the nature of evil.

The Elimination stands among the essential works that document the immense tragedies of the twentieth century, with Primo Levi’s If This Is a Man and Elie Wiesel’s Night .

Rithy Panh is an internationally and critically acclaimed documentary film director and screenwriter. His films include S-21: The Khmer Rouge Killing Machine and Rice People, the first Cambodian film to be submitted for an Oscar, among others. His newest documentary was inspired by The Elimination.
 
Christophe Bataille is a French novelist. His works include the award-winning Annam, Hourmaster, and Absinthe. He has been an editor at Editions Grasset since 1997.