Yuli Tri Suwarni, Bandung – In the eyes of many senior high-school students in Bandung, West Java, a famous New Order propaganda film documenting the Sept. 30, 1965, attempted coup by the now-disbanded Indonesian Communist Party (PKI), is as familiar as it is confusing.
After the screening of the film Pemberontakan G30S PKI (The Sept. 30 PKI Rebellion) at the Indonesia Menggugat Building in Bandung on Thursday, many students stood around chatting with one another, others sat in silence.
Several students who had already seen the film, which was made in 1984, slept in a mosque outside of the screening room. Several students confessed they simply did not "get" the film.
"I don't understand the story line. But I definitely disagree with what the PKI did," said 16-year-old Trisya, one of 320 students from SMAN 9 senior high-school who attended the film screening.
Another student, Sarah Hafitriani, had previously watched the film on TV. During the New Order era, the film was aired on TV every Sept. 30. That tradition ended with the fall of the regime's strong man Soeharto in 1998.
"Basically, the film is about the coup attempt, with some sort of war scenes – people getting cruelly tortured, not given food," the 17-year-old replied when asked to describe the film.
The senior high school's history teacher, Ema Watiamah, said the screening of the film – directed by noted director Arifin C. Noer – had been instructed by the city's Education Office.
The teachers downloaded the film from YouTube for the screening because the school library did not have a copy, nor did local video rental shops, she added. She said all available historical facts incriminated the PKI.
She said she hoped the government would officially provide an accurate historical account of the event to properly educate students and teachers, adding that she knew of at least five books that documented the Sept. 30 abortive coup, and that each pointed to different masterminds.
All of these different versions, she added, were taught to students in classrooms. "We encourage students to read all versions but there's a lack of existing historical documents. However, we still try to stay neutral when teaching about the event although frankly, I'm personally confused about which one is right or wrong," Ema said.
The school's spokesman, Iwan Hermawan, said it was once obligatory for schools to screen the film, but not since 1998. "We try to show the students [the film] to help them clearly understand [the event] and if there's any correction to the film's story line, they know where it is," he said.
The National Education Ministry rewrote school history books in 2004, saying the PKI had been only one of several instigators in the 1965 rebellion. However, in 2006 the ministry went back to solely blaming the PKI on the grounds that positioning the PKI as the main perpetrator was the most acceptable version for Indonesians. The ministry said there had been widespread public resistance to the 2004 version.