Film-making has been a significant feature of Norodom Sihanouk's political career. Sihanouk's films are best understood in terms of his exceptional political talent. Their content and form were both attractive to the Khmer and sensitive to the peculiarities of Cambodia's political circumstances. Sihanouk's film-making was skilfully harnessed to his political goals. The films were part and parcel of Sihanouk's strategy to maintain his relationship with the Khmer population. His fiction films, in particular, enabled him to embrace the contradiction between being a king of a traditional people and the leader of a modem state so that he could communicate his political imperatives in a way that was seen by the Khmer as typical for a king. The content of Sihanouk's films speaks of his political objectives. In the form of royal chronicle, as his documentaries were, or in the form of fabulous tales they are exemplars of symbolic speech. Their political content was disguised by historical allegories and other symbolic representations of political circumstances, groups and figures after the fashion of traditional Khmer texts. Their conclusions appeared logical according to traditional Khmer beliefs and values. Sihanouk's films raised delicate political issues obliquely. Behind their general cultural features the films individually presented a precise argument and, collectively, an ideology which addressed specific situations or issues in Cambodian politics at those times when Sihanouk's power was threatened or restricted. Sihanouk's films were also objects of personal expression, projections of his personality. As such they turn out to be a response to the dilemma that politics posed. Their artistry preserved the kingly qualities intrinsic to his leadership and preferred sense of self.

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