The Year of Living Dangerously
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The Year of Living Dangerously is a novel by Christopher Koch, which was made into a film in 1982, directed by Peter Weir and written by Koch, Weir, and David Williamson.
The story is a complicated psychological plot set in Indonesia during the overthrow of the rule of President Sukarno. It follows a group of expatriate journalists in Jakarta before and around a supposed coup attempt by the Communist Party of Indonesia on September 30, 1965. These events were pivotal in shaping the modern history of Indonesia.
The film stars Mel Gibson as an Australian journalist, Sigourney Weaver as a British Embassy officer, and Linda Hunt as Gibson's local contact, a (male) photographer (for which role she won an Academy Award for Best Supporting Actress). It was banned in Indonesia until 1999.
The title The Year of Living Dangerously is a quote which refers to a famous Italian phrase used by Sukarno; vivere pericoloso, which was supposed to mean "living dangerously". Sukarno borrowed the line for the title of his National Day speech of August 17, 1964.
Plot
Guy Hamilton, a neophyte foreign correspondent for an Australian network, arrives in Jakarta on assignment. He meets the close-knit members of the expatriate community including journalists from the UK, the US and New Zealand, diplomatic personnel, and a Chinese-Australian dwarf of high intelligence and moral seriousness, Billy Kwan.
Guy is initially unsuccessful because his predecessor, tired of life in Indonesia, had sabotaged his contacts, and Guy receives only limited sympathy from the journalist community, which competes for scraps of information from Sukarno's government, the (Communist) PKI and the conservative Moslem military. However, Billy Kwan takes a liking to Guy and gets him interviews, which attracts the jealousy of the USA journalist (portrayed unflatteringly by this Australian film as a drunk and a sex tourist).
Kwan had unfortunately fallen in love with Jill Bryant, played by Sigourney Weaver, a beautiful young assistant at the British embassy, and had resolved after her rejection to find her a proper mate. He manipulates Guy's and Jill's encounters and, after resisting Hamilton because she's returning to the UK, Bryant falls in love with a smitten Guy. This scandalous news is subsequently all over the expat community (the source novel had emphasized the power of sex starvation and gossip in a Third World community under siege by increasing Moslem puritanism combined with Sukarno's anti-imperialism).
Jill Bryant discovers that the Communist Chinese are arming the PKI and passes this information to Guy to save his life, but Guy wants to cover the Communist rebellion that will occur when the arms shipment reaches Jakarta. Billy and Jill are shocked by this and withdraw their friendship, which leaves Guy with the American journalist Pete Curtis, and Guy's assistant, who is secretly PKI.
Hamilton is quietly shanghai'ed by his assistant and driver to keep him from harm and protect the information. Upon return to Jakarta, Hamilton plumbs the depths with the US journalist Pete Curtis but realizes his folly.
Billy, outraged by Sukarno's failure to meet the needs of most Indonesians including a woman he's helped who has lost her child, decides to hang an illegal sign from the Western hotel but is thrown from the window by security men, and dies in Hamilton's arms. His death is also witnessed by Jill Bryant.
Hamilton, who is still in search of "the big story" then visits the Presidential palace in search of a story after the Moslem generals, who have learned of the Communist shipment, have taken over and unleashed the bloodbath of liberals and left-wingers that actually occurred in 1965 with US and Australian complicity. Hamilton is grievously wounded by the guards.
Near-death, Hamilton is visited by Billy's spirit who quotes a passage from the Bhagavad Gita ("all is clouded by desire"). This makes Hamilton realize that he's screwing up his life by having multiple conflicting goals, and in the last scene he makes the last plane out of Jakarta and is reunited with Jill Bryant.
External links
| Films Directed by Peter Weir |
| Homesdale | The Cars That Ate Paris | Picnic at Hanging Rock | The Last Wave | Gallipoli | The Year of Living Dangerously | Witness | The Mosquito Coast | Dead Poets Society | Green Card | Fearless | The Truman Show | [[Master and Commander: The Far Side of the World]] | War Magician | Pattern Recognition |
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