Während sein Vater im Gefängnis sitzt und sein Bruder beruflich im Ausland weilt, arbeitet der junge Rakib als einsamer Haushälter in einem leeren Herrenhaus, das Purna gehört, einem pensionierten General, dessen Familie Rakibs Clan seit Jahrhunderten in einer ländlichen indonesischen Stadt dient. Als Purna nach Hause zurückkehrt, um seinen Wahlkampf für die Bürgermeisterwahl zu beginnen, freundet sich Rakib mit dem älteren Mann an, der zu einem engen Mentor und einer Vaterfigur wird. Er findet seine Berufung als Purnas Assistent in Arbeit und Leben. Als eines Tages Purnas Wahlplakat mutwillig zerstört wird, zögert Rakib nicht, den Schuldigen ausfindig zu machen, und setzt damit eine eskalierende Kette der Gewalt in Gang.

Film Festival Venedig 2022
Fipresci Award, Best Film

Adelaide Film Festival 2022
Feature Fiction Award    

Tokyo Filmex 2022
Grand Prize Best Film

Asia Pacific Screen Awards  
Best Screenplay    

Golden Horse Film Festival and Awards  
NETPAC Award   
Observation Missions for Asian Cinema Award

Stockholm International Film Festival
Best First Film

Marrakech International Film Festival
Best Actor

Indonesian Film Festival
Best Screenplay

DIRECTOR’S NOTE
«Throughout the three decades of Indonesia’s military dictatorship from the mid-Sixties to the late-Nineties, my father worked as a civil servant under the regime. I grew up observing him performing his loyalty to the state as something that seemed inherent to my family’s life. I learnt, by observing him, that loyalty is what makes a person honourable: a principle that I considered to be very true, and at that point in time, satisfyingly rewarding. However, as I grew up, a question began to haunt me: is loyalty still honourable if and when it is pledged to something monstrous? If we annul our loyalty to them, would this be considered a betrayal? Or a fight for justice? And therefore, would this make us a good or bad person? Autobiography is an emotional inquiry into my adolescence, my country, and to the values that I was raised with—which are still being taught everywhere even to this day, twentyfour years after the collapse of the dictatorship. In a society with such a repressed history, what does it take to be able to call oneself ‘a good person’?»