Movie Critique of “The Armenian Genocide”

A very well laid out documentary that creates understanding of the Armenian genocide. Possibly a little biased in which the way it was laid out in attacking other nations for not helping the Armenian people but also very necessary to point out that the other states did nothing. Very clear cut in laying out the information in which Turkey carried out it’s prosecution of the Armenian people and how other nations played a part in this time. The interviews with survivors of the Armenian genocide were very touching and very helpful to understand the pain that the people went through as well as the atrocities that occurred. It is interesting to see what kind decisions were made by each country between the years of this genocide. The Turkish people whom carried out the genocide were convicted and sentenced for the planning and execution of the extermination of the Armenian people. This recognition has happened that these people did terrible things but Turkey has yet to admit that it was genocide but rather just a massacre (which is on a smaller scale). This film is impeccable in showing the disruption and abuse of human rights which led the nation to consider the first acts of genocide or rather crimes against humanity. The value of this film is the prospect that it allows for people to learn about the Armenian genocide due to the fact that many schools (in my perspective in the U.S.) ever teach about the Armenian genocide. It is also a very valuable film because of the accounts that it has of the survivors as well as accounts of the ambassadors.

I thought that this documentary was very informative as well as very emotional. The documentary had a good mixture of the facts and history of the Armenian Genocide and the accounts from the survivors of the genocide. The Armenian survivors’ stories of their escape or survival from the genocide of their people were intense and it was hard to hear how they were treated and how they were hunted down and killed. It’s hard to comprehend how a nation could do such a thing. It’s also hard to understand how other nations around the world did not step in and help out the Armenian people even though there were reports of the ambassadors from other countries that they were targeting a population and most likely mass killing them. One quote that really stood out was from the U.S. Ambassador to Turkey, “When the Turkish authorities gave the orders for these deportations, they were merely giving the death warrant to a whole race: they understood this well, and, in their conversations with me, they made no particular attempt to conceal the fact.” The fact of the matter is that even with reports from the ambassadors, other countries did not step in to stop the genocide.

I think the message of this film is to send out information concerning the Armenian genocide and I think it does a really good job of it. The message is meant to protest against such massacres and tell people and nations that it is partially their fault, letting it happen and not doing anything about it until thousands were killed. This should never happen again in the future and they need to stand up against the nation doing these atrocities. This atrocity specifically is a state committing crimes against humanity which is a violation of the human rights laid out by the United Nations. After WWII, the Convention on the Prevention and Punishment of the Crime of Genocide was created and entered into forced in 1951. This convention (if signed and ratified) defines and outlines the definition of genocide and requires states to take action to rectify these crimes. Even so with this new convention the reasons behind this convention are because human rights were violated, one in particular: the right to life.