"a stunning film – one of the most amazing films I've seen ... it's one of the most gripping and moving films I have ever seen." Stephen Holden of The New York Times reviewed the film twice. In his first review, he called it "an inspiring film." In his second review, he wrote, "Enemies of the People is extraordinary on several fronts. At times, Mr. Thet Sambath suggests a one-man Cambodian Truth and Reconciliation Commission. Instead of affixing blame, he seeks the healing power of confession." Andrew Schenker in the Village Voice noted an antecedent in Holocaust cinema: "Taking in Enemies of the People is a little like watching a Cambodian Shoah, but as if we had access to the director's methods and motivations instead of just the astonishing results." Diego Costa in Slant Magazine concentrated on the film's journey into the psychological dimension of the violence: "This is an extraordinary historical document, an archive of confessions with potential for closure, atonement, and belated punishment from one single man on a mission." Gary Goldstein of the Los Angeles Times found the film "fascinating," writing, "How the genial Sambath remains so circumspect throughout his taut sessions with Chea is remarkable, as is so much of this must-see exposé." Elliot V. Kotek in Moving Pictures wrote: "The slow, painful truth is fully revealed in this burning documentary crafted courageously by Sambath and his co-director Lemkin." In the Financial Times, film critic Nigel Andrews gives the film four out of five stars and sees it in the context of Vietnam War cinema. "War crimes cinema gets a new wrinkle, or scar of honour, in Rob Lemkin and Thet Sambath's enthralling investigative documentary. Shades of Heart of Darkness and Apocalypse Now, as this new Kurtz is tracked to his lair. For Conrad and Coppola the landscape traversed was a jungle. Here it is a jungle of the mind." In a review from Sundance, the same critic wrote:"If vengeance is a dish best served cold, this dish is at once cold and scalding hot." Derek Malcolm in This is London wrote: "This astonishing documentary by Cambodian journalist Thet Sambath, whose entire family was killed by the Khmer Rouge, gets as near as anyone has done to discovering how and why the killing fields happened." Derek Adams of Time Out gives the film five out of five stars: "This is patient, persistent, probing and fearless journalism