The documentary film Landmines tells the uplifting story of nineteen young circus performers who created a circus production, See You Yesterday, as a way to move backwards in time across generations separated by genocide. As they find a way to balance the veil of silence between the two generations, they begin a search for what really happened.
In the beginning, most of them don’t even believe there had been a genocide at all. But as they explore new circus techniques in order to revisit what their elders had gone through, they begin to find a truth which they would like to understand more deeply than the small fragments of whispers they have overheard. Using their extraordinary physical skills, they create a reality onstage to confront their own denial and examine the fragments of partial truths and lies that are still flying around their heads—the remnants of the regime's indoctrination. They interview those members of their families who managed to survive, as well as former Khmer soldiers and survivors, and find a surprising sense of understanding of the generation they thought they had wanted to run away from. They begin to create a reality where they can understand what it might mean to need to forgive themselves before they forgive their ancestors.
The performers realize their dream of traveling to foreign lands, performing for 18,000 Congolese refugees living on the border of Rwanda. There, genocide meets genocide as both peoples realize that they are no longer alone.