Chocolate release date moved up to February 6, going head-to-head with Stephen Chow's CJ7

Chocolate, the new Muay Thai and martial arts actioner from the Ong-Bak directorial team of Prachya Pinkaew and Panna Rittikrai, and CJ7, Stephen Chow's eagerly anticipated followup to Kung Fu Hustle, will be released in Thailand cinemas on February 6.

This is a day earlier than had been previously announced. The move was made to capitalize on the long weekend for Chinese New Year, with Lunar New Year's Day being on Thursday, February 7. Like other parts of Asia, Chinese New Year is a big deal in Thailand, so the movie distributors want to roll out some attractive titles for everyone's holiday leisure time.

I don't know which film I'm more excited about seeing. Perhaps I'll try to see them back-to-back on the same day, in the same cinema, if I can find one that's playing CJ7 with the original soundtrack.

I caught the extended new trailer for CJ7 last night before catching a late showing of the heartwarming romance, Cloverfield. I doubt very much that Chow's new movie, about a little alien Tribble with legs bonding with a little boy (Chow plays the kid's beleaguered dad), is going to leave anyone disappointed. I think the trailer is just a hint of the fun to be had.

Meanwhile, the anticipation for Chocolate is growing and growing, fuelled by those crazy, action-packed trailers (which do you want: subtitled or non?) People just can't wait for it to be released. Imagine their disappointment when they find out they will likely have to wait many months for a legal DVD with English subtitles to surface. I will be very surprised if such a thing happens any sooner than sometime in 2009.

Mark Pollard of Kung Fu Cinema has caught the Chocolate craving, saying:

I have a new first love and I don’t even know how to pronounce her name. It’s no contest. Nicharee Vismistananda is this year’s “it” girl, even if takes another year or more for the rest of the world to catch on. With wholesome good looks and unholy ass-whippin’ ability, she is about to unleash several years of intensive screen-fight training upon Thai audiences.

Pollard points out that the only overseas company that has purchased the distribution rights for Chocolate is Indo-Overseas, for India. The Weinstein Company has rights to Ong-Bak 2, which Tony Jaa is directing on his own, while Prachya concentrated on Chocolate, causing a rift between the two. Ong-Bak 2 doesn't even have a release date yet, but no one else has picked up Chocolate. If the Weinsteins did get the rights, I wonder what they would rename it?