Educational Media Reviews Online

This documentary explores the opium economy of the Golden Triangle, a remote, mountainous area of Myanmar, Laos and Thailand, in close proximity China. The director has taken great care to make a complete explanation of the opium poppy farming industry, from interviewing the farmers and family members, the local drug lords Peng Jashing and Pao Yu Chan; to interviewing national and international officials such as Xavier Bouen (UN Drug Control Agency), and John Whelan (U.S. Drug Enforcement Agency, Myanmar). Essentially, the illicit economy was generated from China’s making the growing and use of opium a criminal offense in the 1980’s, forcing the opium trade underground: a clandestine network of opium farming and delivery run by the drug lords. The Golden Triangle farmers are slaves to the opium trade. They have no other cash crop and once a field is cultivated for opium poppies, it is good for no other crop. Almost all the farmers and their families are addicted to opium use and they have no easy means of fighting their addiction. Last, the demand for opium is down as the drug lords move to manufacture of amphetamines, leaving the local farmers out of the loop. The future for the inhabitants of the Golden Triangle? Dead end.

The quality of the audio and video is excellent. The recording and use of local music adds much to creating the beautiful atmosphere of the Golden Triangle for the film. Narration is in English, and except for a few interviews in English, the interview segments are handled through subtitles.

The Golden Triangle offers understated commentary on contemporary conditions in the remote, opium-producing area of Southeast Asia where governments and NGO’s seem incapable of breaking the tradition of opium farming. Addiction and poverty are ways of life in this area where conditions prohibit even subsistence farming. Though even the drug lords appear to empathize with the plight of the opium farmers, there seems to be no escape of the death spiral of their society. This film is recommended for the significant commentary it makes on the pervasive effects of drugs in society, even in the very societies that have no choice but to participate in the cultivation of illegal substances. As the United States, United Nations, and other organizations attempt to eradicate the farming of opium poppies in Afghanistan and Southeast Asia, this film offers a compelling argument that somehow the peoples and cultures that are forced to farm opium be given some alternatives that will allow their continued existence.