Chua Fah Din Salai tops Bangkok Critics nominations

The steamy romantic drama Chua Fah Din Salai (Eternity) continues its roll through Thailand's movie-awards season, with 12 nominations for the Bangkok Critics Assembly Awards.

Directed by ML Bhandevanop Devakul and starring Ananda Everingham and "Ploy" Chermarn Boonyasak, Chua Fah Din Salai is nominated in all 11 categories. The period romance already swept most of the Kom Chad Luek Awards and is the top nominee for the StarPics Awards.

Other top nominees include Nak Prok (The Shadow of the Naga) with 10 nominations, Wisit Sasanatieng's Insee Daeng (The Red Eagle) with seven nods and the travel romance Rao Song Sam Khon (That Sounds Good) with six nominations.

Ananda is a double nominee for best actor for Chua Fah Din Salai and The Red Eagle.

The indie film Sawan Baan Na (Agrarian Utopia) by Uruphong Raksasad got four nods and Apichatpong Weerasethakul's Uncle Boonmee Who Can Recall His Past Lives and Anocha Suwichakornpong's Mundane History each got three nominations.

And the popular GTH films Guan Muen Ho and The Little Comedian also got three nominations.

Here's the list of nominees:

Best picture

• Chua Fah Din Salai (Eternity), Sahamongkol Film International
• Nak Prok (Shadow of the Naga), Sahamongkol Film International
• Rao Song Sam Khon (That Sounds Good), M-Thirtynine
• Sawan Baan Na (Agrarian Utopia), Extra Virgin
• Insee Daeng (The Red Eagle), Five Star Production

Director

• "Leo" Kittikorn Liawsirikul, Rao Song Sam Khon (That Sounds Good)
  
• ML Bhandevanop Devakul, Chua Fah Din Salai (Eternity)
• Wisit Sasanatieng, Insee Daeng (The Red Eagle)
• Apichatpong Weerasethakul, Lung Boonmee Raleuk Chat (Uncle Boonmee Who Can Recall His Past Lives)
• Uruphong Raksasad, Sawan Baan Na (Agrarian Utopia)

Actor

• Chawin Likitjareonpong, Baan Chan ... Talok Wai Gon (Por Son Wai) (The Little Comedian)
• Choosak Iamsuk, Meu Peun Dao Pra Sao (Saturday Killer)
• Somchai Kemklad, Nak Prok (Shadow of the Naga)
• Ananda Everingham, Chua Fah Din Salai (Eternity)
• Ananda Everingham, Insee Daeng (The Red Eagle)

Actress

• Chermarn Boonyasak, Chua Fah Din Salai (Eternity)
• Neungtida Sophon, Guan Muen Ho (Hello Stranger)
• Pimchanok Luevisetpaibool, Sing Lek Lek Thee Riak Wa … Ruk (First Love)
• Rattanrat Eertaweekul, Rao Song Sam Khon (That Sounds Good)
• Siripan Wattanajinda, 9 Wat

Supporting actor

• Jaturong Phonboon, Baan Chan ... Talok Wai Gon (Por Son Wai) (The Little Comedian)
• Teerapong Leowrakwong, Chua Fah Din Salai (Eternity)
• Pitisak Yaowanon, Nak Prok (Shadow of the Naga)
• Sa-ad Piampongsan, Nak Prok (Shadow of the Naga)
• Sakkaraj Rerkthamrong, Chua Fah Din Salai (Eternity)

Supporting actress

• Kanya Rattapetch, Krai ... Nai Hong (Who R U)
• Daraneenuch Pothipithi, Chua Fah Din Salai (Eternity)
• Ramita Mahapreukpong, Rao Song Sam Khon (That Sounds Good)
• Ornanong Panyawong, Baan Chan ... Talok Wai Gon (Por Son Wai) (The Little Comedian)
• Intira Charoenpura, Nak Prok (Shadow of the Naga)

Screenplay

• Jao Nok Krajok (Mundane History), Anocha Suwichakornpong
• Chua Fah Din Salai (Eternity), ML Bhandevanop Devakul
• Nak Prok (Shadow of the Naga), Koses Charittiporn, Nut Nualpang, Phawat Panangkasiri
• Lung Boonmee Raleuk Chat (Uncle Boonmee Who Can Recall His Past Lives), Apichatpong Weerasethakul
• Insee Daeng (The Red Eagle), Wisit Sasanatieng

Director of photography

• Jao Nok Krajok (Mundane History), Ming Kai Leung
• Chua Fah Din Salai (Eternity), Teerawat Rujintham
• Nak Prok (Shadow of the Naga), Teerawat Rujintham
• Rao Song Sam Khon (That Sounds Good), Thamjaroen Promphan, Somsak Srisawat
• Sawan Baan Na (Agrarian Utopia), Uruphong Raksasad

Editing

• Guan Muen Ho (Hello Stranger), Thammarat Sumetsupachok
• Chua Fah Din Salai (Eternity), Sunij Asavinikul, Phannipha Kabillikavanich
• Nak Prok (Shadow of the Naga), Tawat Siripon
• Sawan Baan Na (Agrarian Utopia)
• , Uruphong Raksasad
• Insee Daeng (The Red Eagle), Sunit Asvinikul, Phannipha Kabillikavanich

Score

• Guan Muen Ho (Hello Stranger), Chatchai Pongprapaphan, Krissanasak Kantathamwawong
• Chua Fah Din Salai (Eternity), Chamras Saewataporn
• Nak Prok (Shadow of the Naga), Narinthon Na Bangchang
• Rao Song Sam Khon (That Sounds Good), Giant Wave, Mongkol Pongwachirin, Prawit Keskasem
• Insee Daeng (The Red Eagle), Wild at Heart

Art direction

• Jao Nok Krajok (Mundane History), Parinda Moongmaipho
• Chua Fah Din Salai (Eternity), Siranat Ratchusanti
• Nak Prok (Shadow of the Naga), Sophon Pulsawat
• Lung Boonmee Raleuk Chat (Uncle Boonmee Who Can Recall His Past Lives), Akekarat Homlaor
• Insee Daeng (The Red Eagle), Wittaya Chaimongkol, Phairot Siriwath, Pallop Chomtawor

Box office winner: Guan Muen Ho

Lifetime Achievement Award: Piak Poster

The awards presentation will be on February 23 at the Army Club on Vibhavadi-Rangsit Road.

(Via Deknang, Extra Virgin)

Stella!

What's Stella Malucchi been up to since she made her big-screen acting debut as the heroine in Wisit Sasanatieng's Tears of the Black Tiger in 2000? She acted in one other Thai film, Anguilmala.

And since then the Bangkok-based actress and model of Columbian and Italian heritage has been busy raising a family and looking after her family's import-export business.

But around a year ago, she lost a leg due to a rare disease – hyperparathyroidism.

You can read more about her amazing recovery and catch up with her life in an article from the Bangkok Post's Brunch magazine.

StarPics nominations in chains with Chua Fah Din Salai

The lavish and steamy romantic drama Chua Fah Din Salai (Eternity) looks set to sweep through Thailand's movie-awards season, with 12 nominations across 11 categories in the StarPics Awards. Other top StarPics nominees include Uncle Boonmee Who Can Recall His Past Lives, Shadow of the Naga, Mundane History and Guan Muen Ho.

Director ML Bhandevanop Devakul's Eternity, starring Ananda Everingham and "Ploy" Chermarn Boonyasak and produced by Sahamongkol Film International, is nominated in every category, including best picture, director, screenplay and best actor and actress. It's the story of a despotic Burmese timber baron (Teerapong Leowrakwong, also a best-actor nominee) who chains together his young wife (Ploy) and his nephew (Ananda) after they're caught cheating on him.

Indie director Apichatpong Weerasethakul's Cannes Palme d'Or winner Uncle Boonmee Who Can Recall His Past Lives has eight nominations, tied with Sahamongkol Film International's Buddhist-themed crime drama Shadow of the Naga, directed by Phawat Panangkasiri. Both are up for best picture, director and screenplay.

The indie social drama Mundane History by Anocha Suwichakornpong has seven nominations, including best picture, director and score. Mundane's editor Lee Chatametikool is a double nominee, also up for editing honors on Uncle Boonmee.

The much-acclaimed Agrarian Utopia is up for best picture as well as honors for the cinematography by director Uruphong Raksasad.

Interestingly, Uncle Boonmee, Mundane History and Agrarian Utopia are all indie films that only had limited theatrical releases last year. Until recent years, Thailand's movie awards generally concentrated on big industry movies because the independent films usually only played at film festivals.

Studio GTH's popular South Korean travel romance Guan Meun Ho, which was the No. 1 Thai movie at the box office last year, scored five nominations, including best director for Banjong Pisanthanakun and actor and actress nods for the two leads, Chantavit Thanasevi and Neungtida Sophon.

Other best-acting nominees include Jenjira Pongpas from Uncle Boonmee Who Can Recall His Past Lives. She's the veteran actress who's appeared in most of Apichatpong's features and shorts. Another Kick the Machine stock-company player, Sakda Kaewbuadee, is up for supporting actor for Boonmee.

Young actress "Bai Fern" Pimchanok Luevisetpaibool from the Sahamongkol teen romance Sing Lek Lek Thee Riak Wa … Ruk (First Love), the box-office No. 2 last year, is nominated, as is Apinya Sakuljaroensuk for the indie romance Sammidti (สามมิติ, Behind the Scene), which had a limited release at Bangkok's House cinema.

The supporting-actress category pits veteran singer-actress "Mai" Sirimol Charoenpura, who played a pickpocketing hooker in the Phranakorn horror shorts compilation Tai Hong against her castmate "Kratae" Supaksorn Chaimongkol as well as against her half sister, "Sai" Intira Charoenpura, who played a prostitute in Shadow of the Naga.

The acting category also includes comedian Choosak Iamsuk for his lead role in Yuthlert Sippapak's hitman comedy Saturday Killer and Somchai Kemklad as a bank robber who dons monk's robes in Shadow of the Naga. Veteran actor Sa-ad Piampongsan is nominated in the supporting category, also for Shadow of the Naga.

Eternity earlier swept the most prizes in the Kom Chad Luek Awards. Other awards still to come include the Bangkok Critics Assembly and top industry honors, the Subhanahongsa Awards.

Here's the list of nominees:


Score

• Guan Meun Ho (Hello Stranger), Chatchai Pongprapaphan, Krissanasak Kantathamwawong
• Jao Nok Krajok (Mundane History), Photosticker Machine, Furniture
• Chua Fah Din Salai (Eternity), Chamras Saewataporn
• Rao Song Sam Khon (That Sounds Good), Giant Wave, Mongkol Pongwachirin, Prawit Keskasem
• Insee Daeng (The Red Eagle), Wild at Heart

Art direction

• Jao Nok Krajok (Mundane History), Parinda Moongmaipho
• Chua Fah Din Salai (Eternity), Siranat Ratchusanti
• Nak Prok (Shadow of the Naga), Sophon Pulsawat
• Lung Boonmee Raleuk Chat (Uncle Boonmee Who Can Recall His Past Lives), Akekarat Homlaor
• Insee Daeng (The Red Eagle), Wittaya Chaimongkol, Phairot Siriwath, Pallop Chomtawor

Cinematography

• Jao Nok Krajok (Mundane History), Ming Kai Leung
• Chua Fah Din Salai (Eternity), Teerawat Rujintham
• Rao Song Sam Khon (That Sounds Good), Thamjaroen Promphan, Somsak Srisawat
• Lung Boonmee Raleuk Chat (Uncle Boonmee Who Can Recall His Past Lives), Yukontorn Mingmongkon, Sayombhu Mukdeeprom
• Sawan Baan Na (Agrarian Utopia), Uruphong Raksasad

Editing

• Guan Meun Ho (Hello Stranger), Thammarat Sumetsupachok
• Jao Nok Krajok (Mundane History), Lee Chatametikool
• Chua Fah Din Salai (Eternity), Sunij Asavinikul, Phannipha Kabillikavanich
• Nak Prok (Shadow of the Naga), Tawat Siripon
• Lung Boonmee Raleuk Chat (Uncle Boonmee Who Can Recall His Past Lives), Lee Chatametikool

Screenplay

• Jao Nok Krajok (Mundane History), Anocha Suwichakornpong
• Chua Fah Din Salai (Eternity), ML Bhandevanop Devakul
• Nak Prok (Shadow of the Naga), Koses Charittiporn, Nut Nualpang, Phawat Panangkasiri
• Baan Chan ... Talok Wai Gon (Por Son Wai) (The Little Comedian), Aummaraporn Phandintong, Wittaya Thongyuyong, Mez Tharatorn.
• Lung Boonmee Raleuk Chat (Uncle Boonmee Who Can Recall His Past Lives), Apichatpong Weerasethakul

Supporting actress

• Daraneenuch Pothipithi, Chua Fah Din Salai (Eternity)
• Lakkana Wattanawongsiri, Namtan Daeng (Brown Sugar)
• Supaksorn Chaimongkol, Tai Hong (Still, a.k.a. Die a Violent Death)
• Sirimol Charoenpura, Tai Hong (Still, a.k.a. Die a Violent Death)
• Intira Charoenpura, Nak Prok (Shadow of the Naga)

Supporting actor

• Jaturong Phonboon, Baan Chan ... Talok Wai Gon (Por Son Wai) (The Little Comedian)
• Sakda Kaewbuadee, Lung Boonmee Raleuk Chat (Uncle Boonmee Who Can Recall His Past Lives)
• Sakkaraj Rerkthamrong, Chua Fah Din Salai (Eternity)
• Sa-ad Piampongsan, Nak Prok (Shadow of the Naga)

Actress

• Jenjira Pongpas, Lung Boonmee Raleuk Chat (Uncle Boonmee Who Can Recall His Past Lives)
• "Ploy" Chermarn Boonyasak, Chua Fah Din Salai (Eternity)
• Pimchanok Luevisetpaibool, Sing Lek Lek Thee Riak Wa … Ruk (First Love)
• Neungtida Sophon, Guan Muen Ho (Hello Stranger)
• Apinya Sakuljaroensuk, Sammidti (Behind the Scenes)

Actor

• Chantavit Thanasevi, Guan Muen Ho (Hello Stranger)
• Choosak Iamsuk, Meu Peun Dao Pra Sao (Saturday Killer)
• Teerapong Leowrakwong, Chua Fah Din Salai (Eternity)
• Somchai Kemklad, Nak Prok (Shadow of the Naga)
• Ananda Everingham, Chua Fah Din Salai (Eternity)

Director

• Banjong Pisanthanakun, Guan Muen Ho (Hello Stranger)
• ML Bhandevanop Devakul, Chua Fah Din Salai (Eternity)
• Phawit Panangkasiri, Nak Prok (Shadow of the Naga)
• Anocha Suwichakornpong, Jao Nok Krajok (Mundane History),
• Apichatpong Weerasethakul, Lung Boonmee Raleuk Chat (Uncle Boonmee Who Can Recall His Past Lives)

Best picture

• Jao Nok Krajok (Mundane History), Houdini Studio
• Chua Fah Din Salai (Eternity), Sahamongkol Film International
• Nak Prok (Shadow of the Naga), Sahamongkol Film International
• Lung Boonmee Raleuk Chat (Uncle Boonmee Who Can Recall His Past Lives), Kick the Machine
• Sawan Baan Na (Agrarian Utopia), Extra Virgin

Lifescapes South East Asian Film Festival, Chiang Mai, February 3-6

Uruphong Raksasad's Agrarian Utopia and Apichatpong Weerasethakul's Uncle Boonmee Who Can Recall His Past Lives are the opening and closing films of the the Lifescapes South East Asian Film Festival at Payap University in Chiang Mai from February 3 to 6.

The fest focuses on regional issues and human-rights struggles with films from Cambodia, Laos, Burma, Thailand and Vietnam.

Other Thai films include Kon Jon Poo Ying Yai (คนจนผู้ยิ่งใหญ่), an unreleased work by Sueb Boonsong Nakphoo that "explores the people in rural Thailand, living in the hardest place at the hardest time", and shorts from Rung Uan, a Chiang Rai NGO that trains young filmmakers.

Other highlights include Bradley Cox's documentary Who Killed Chea Vichea?, about the death of the Cambodian labor leader; Only Love, the latest feature by Laotian director Anousone Sirsackda; The Prison Where I Live, on the jailed Burmese comedian Zarganar; and The Most Secret Place on Earth, a documentary looking at the lingering aftermath of the CIA's "secret war" in Laos.

Aside from film screenings, there's talks, among them a panel discussion on censorship featuring Tanwarin Sukhaphisit, director of the banned Insects in the Backyard.

The closing film, which will take place at the Major Cineplex Airport Plaza, will be the Chiang Mai premiere of Uncle Boonmee Who Can Recall His Past Lives, which despite having been shown around Thailand in limited theatrical engagements last year, missed Apichatpong's adopted hometown.

The full schedule is at the festival website.

Phangan Film Festival, February 4-6

Agrarian Utopia, Uruphong Raksasad's award-winning documentary on a pair of struggling farming families, makes its Koh Phangan premiere in the Phangan Film Festival, February 4 to 6 at the Holiday Beach Resort in Thongsala, Koh Phangan.

The fest features a mix of shorts and features, mainly documentaries on environmental and spiritual themes. Other titles include Bag It! Is Your Life Too Plastic, Hippie Masala – Forever in India, A Mongolian Couch, Youssou N'Dour: I Bring What I Love and Dirt!! The Movie.

More on Wisit Sasanatieng's Muay Thai movie Suriya

Wisit Sasanatieng is at the International Film Festival Rotterdam, taking part in the Tiger Awards jury. The fest is also screening his latest movie, The Red Eagle.

When he was making The Red Eagle, Wisit said he was finished with making movies for the studios. He's looking to get back to making movies his way, and so he's pitching his first independent project, Suriya, at Cinemart.

He sent along a snazzy poster for the Muay Thai picture, which is a biographical drama about a fighter named Suriya Lukthung, a gifted and ingenious boxer. Here's more of his story:

Nobody knows about his mysterious origin.

He is thin and skinny like a sick person. But once he is on the boxing stadium, he becomes a killer, fast and furious. With his boxing style “double kicks” and “double elbows” which he invents. No one has ever stood up to round three.

He uses alcohol to carry on life and sleeps at a cheap whorehouse every night.

He is not under any boxing camp. No one ever sees him practice.

Every time he wins. He will take the prize money and leave quietly with disregard for any honorable reputation.

Later people will see him at the whorehouse surrounded with prostitutes. The liquor is in his hand and the cigarette is in the mouth. With his sleepy eyes, he is such a different person comparing with the one on the canvas.

His life goes like fireworks, and it ended quickly.

Soon after he lives in extreme, he gets a bad disease from prostitutes. Then he has to go to the fight just to make money to cure himself. He still beats the rival as always although it's not fast like before.

Finally, when his health starts deteriorating, the defeat begins to come online.He still fights with a weaken body and his eyes are near blind because of the syphilis.

But he never lets himself be knocked out at the boxing stadium. He just asks for surrender once he is aware that his time has come.

The rest of his life is facing hard liquor. He drinks as if to kill himself. He drinks morbidly until he gets crazy. He dies later.

A short moment before he died, someone saw him drunk, standing and holding a balloon in the rain. Then he let it rise to the sky, clapping and laughing merrily as if a child.

As Twitch's Todd Brown says, it's "the story of such a larger than life character seems perfectly suited to Sasanatieng's larger than life style. Hopefully this one finds the backing it needs."

Pimpaka's Terribly Happy in Berlinale Shorts competition

Pimpaka Towira's Terribly Happy (สุดสะแนน, Sudsanan) is among the 25 films in competition in the Berlinale Shorts.

The ambitious 30-minute short runs the length of Thailand in its story of a young soldier, on patrol as a ranger in the rubber plantations of restive Southern Thailand. He then goes on leave to his home province in the Northeast of Thailand in Udon Thani, where he finds his girlfriend has taken up with one of the many elderly Western men who've retired there.

Terribly Happy premiered last year as part of the Film Festival in Commemoration of the Celebration on the Auspicious Occasion of His Majesty the King's 83rd Birthday Anniversary.

According to production company Extra Virgin, Terribly Happy was conceived as a companion piece to Pimpaka's upcoming feature, The Island Funderal.

Other Berlinale Shorts include Park Chan-wook's iPhone film Paranmanjang.

The Thai short hits Berlin along with the Forum features, Thunska Pansittivorakul's The Terrorists and Aditya Assarat's Hi-So.

Berlinale runs from February 10 to 20.

My Father, Cherie and more Thai shorts in Rotterdam

Short films by Pimpaka Towira, Wichanon Somumjarn, Nawapol Thamrongrattanarit and Phuttiphong Aroonpheng are in the International Film Festival Rotterdam's Spectrum program:

Three of the shorts form the combined program Homecoming:

• All That Remains, Wichanon Somumjarn, 2010, 8 min. The filmmaker collects memories of his youth. His brother often told him about being stung by a poisonous jellyfish. Here he retells the story.
• My Father, Pimpaka Towira, 2010, 22 min. We watched the confrontation between those in power and the people in Bangkok on television. But who were the demonstrators? We follow one back to his village.
• Cherie Is Korean-Thai, Nawapol Thamrongrattanarit, 2010, 19 min. A matter of casting. A diva-like soap actress is given the role of a female builder, opening her eyes to the lives of others. Very witty.

All That Remains was previously screened at the World Film Festival of Bangkok. Pimpaka's politically colored My Father premiered at last year's Dubai International Film Festival in the Muhr Asia-Africa Competition for Short Films. And Nawapol's Cherie Is Korean-Thai was the top prize-winner at the 14th Thai Short Film & Video Festival.

Another Rotterdam shorts program, Memory and Loss, has A Tale of Heaven, a 6-minute work by Phuttiphong Aroonpheng. The Thai-Japanese production is described as "A delicate Thai Super-8 film in which a spirit comes back to visit the family. Something accepted as normal in Thailand."

Those are in addition to the Thai entries in Rotterdam: Sivaroj Kongsakul's feature Eternity (Tee Rak) and Jakrawal Nilthamrong's short Immortal Woman in the Tiger Awards competition, plus Wisit Sasanatieng's The Red Eagle and the pan-Asian shorts trilogy Breakfast, Lunch, Dinner by Wang Jing, Anocha Suwichakornpong and Kaz Cai.

In Space earns special mention in Prague

Visra Vichit-Vadakan's short film In Space, the story of a young Buddhist monk attaining "a safe space between the present and the afterlife", won a special mention at the Prague Short Film Festival, which ran from January 19 to 23.

The 2009 17-minute short was among the 15 films in Prague's international competition. It was shot in New York by the U.S.-schooled Thai filmmaker, who was recently married in Bangkok and drew an Internet celebrity to her wedding.

Previous appearances for In Space have included the 2009 World Film Festival of Bangkok, last year's International Film Festival Rotterdam, the Tribeca Film Festival, NYU's First Run Film Festival, Slamdance and last year's Thai Short Film & Video Festival, where it was a runner-up.

Visra has a feature project, Karma Police, in CineMart at the International Film Festival Rotterdam, starting this week.

(Via Prague Monitor)

Salaya Doc 2011: Capsule reviews

The first Salaya International Documentary Festival wrapped up over the weekend. It was organized by the Thai Film Foundation and the Thai Film Archive and held in the Sri Salaya Theatre, featuring films supported by the Asian Network of Documentary as well as a tribute to Shinsuke Ogawa, an influential Japanese documentarian. I hit this weekend's shows, and here's what I saw:

Summer in Narita – This was the fest's opening film and I was glad it had an encore screening during the closing weekend. Filmed in 1966, Shinsuke Ogawa embeds himself with the farmers and students protesting the building of Tokyo's Narita International Airport. It's in black and white and the humanistic sytle reminded me of Kurosawa's films, like Seven Samurai or Yojimbo, which were recently screened in Bangkok as part of the Japanese Film Festival's Akira Kurosawa Centenary Retrospective. But I also couldn't help but think about Thailand's red-shirt protesters, who style themselves as peasants (even if their leaders are wealthy) and adopted some of the same tactics as the Narita farmers.

Sona: The Other Myself – Yang Yonghi's film offers a rare glimpse at life in North Korea, thanks to relatives living there who have a young niece named Sona, whom Yang sees as a sort of alternate universe version of her. Through family videos and photos, the film covers the little girl's growing from a toddler to a bright teenager. It also includes those jaw-dropping displays of North Korean patriotism – the flag-waving stadium pageants and stage productions extolling the virtues of the Great Leader and the Dear Leader.

Narita: Peasants of the Second Fortress – Six years after Summer in Narita, Ogawa is still embedded with the peasant farmers, who are still protesting the airport, and even more determined to hold on to their land. This 1971 Narita film has more action, as the camera gets in the thick of skirmishes between the peasants and the riot police, and is up close and personal with women who chain themselves to trees. It's muddier, nastier and cold. The camera also goes underground, for an extended visit in one of the many tunnels dug by the peasants, where the aimed to live and not be moved. Again, I was reminded of Thailand's red shirts, and how easily the Thai military's tanks and armored cars rolled through the bamboo barricades and piles of burning tires. In Second Fortress, the barbed-wire barricades and chained-up protesters are removed by force and the tunnels wiped away by heavy earth-moving machinery. All in the name of progress. Next time I transit through Japan, I'll have a different outlook as I survey the ground from my comfortable airline seat and rush through the departure lounges to make my connecting flight.

New Castle – Guo Hengqi's documentary reminded me a lot of one of my favorite films, John Sayle's Matewan, about the "Bloody Mingo" labor battle between union coal miners and the company gun thugs. "It were 19 and 20," intoned the narrator, who goes on to relate that "these were hand-loading days." Only this isn't 19 and 20. This is 2007, but Chinese coal miners are still using 1920s technology, loading coal by hand and dying and being maimed in their holes. There's also a look at the local farmers and their ways of life, herding goats and growing produce. The miners sit around and gripe about their conditions, until they are reminded that they are working, which is what they wanted. And that's a reality vividly brought to light when the mine is closed in a clean-air initiative ahead of the 2008 Beijing Olympics. Further, all the traditional old villages and homes are to be demolished, and everyone is forced to move into a new Western-style housing project, little boxes, one on top of another. It's a bleak, self-defeating existence that I can't imagine benefits anyone except maybe the companies that built these apartments.

Hope Dies Last in War – Supriyo Sen takes a look at Indian families of air force pilots shot down during the Indo-Pakistani War of 1971. The spouses and children believe their husbands and fathers are still being held as prisoners of war. They hold regular protests to call attention to their plight. To underline their belief, at the beginning of the film there's a repatriation of Pakistani soldiers held in India since that conflict. It's a heart-rending argument, what with the wife, who recalls fondly the year and half she spend with her pilot husband, in her youth. Or of the now-adult son of another pilot believed to still be held. Yet neither side will admit to anything about the missing men.

Disorder – Huang Weikai compiles footage shot by various amateur cameramen to paint a damning portrait of the new urban China, where cities are populated by people who clearly have no clue and authorities who are ever-so-frustrated to keep order. It's a sort of Cops: In China, with the camera showing up with policemen, firemen and ambulance crews as they respond to various bizarre disturbances, such as hogs on the highway, a mentally ill man dancing in traffic and another laying down in the street, who may or may not be faking being hit by a car. Also a poor dude who finds a roach in his bowl of noodles but is told by a matter-of-fact cop there's nothing they can do. So the guy is out a bowl of noodles. There's fires, floods and a disgruntled man in his boxers, ready to jump from a bridge unless he gets justice. In grainy black-and-white, Disorder is brutal, unflinching and pulsating with sad intensity, the type of which is like a bad train wreck you cannot look away from.

Passion – The history of the cinema of Mongolia is covered in this portrait of Binder Jigjid, son of legendary Mongolian director Jigjid Dejid. Binder, while having had a taste of filmmaking under a grand, socialist-sponsored scale with his father and the once-giant Mongol Kino studio, has had to adapt to a new reality in Mongolia's market-driven economy. So he's making low-budget direct-to-video historical dramas and driving them from village to village, across deserts, steppes and the frozen tundra, organizing screenings in community centers and town halls as he goes. Director Byamba Sakhya, himself a part of Mongolia's new filmmaking reality, joins this elder cinema statesman on his journey.

Lumpinee – The schoolhouse brawling, rubber-band-blowing novice Buddhist monk might raise eyebrows among Thailand's cultural authorities while the rest of the world might wring their hands in worry for the children – the children! – in this documentary by Chira Wichaisuthikul, which premiered at last year's International Documentary Film Festival Rotterdam and was supported by that fest's Jan Vrijman Fund. It's a Muay Thai movie. The title refers to the Bangkok boxing stadium that's a mecca for all the country's fighters, but most of the action takes place in a boxing camp in a village in Trang, in southern Thailand. There, the focus is mainly on the young boys who live at the camp and train to be boxers, throwing knee kicks, working the heavy bag, jumping rope and running, morning and night. On one hand, there will be child advocates who decry throwing the kids into this violent world where they are often exploited by their parents and unscrupulous trainers. On the other hand, Muay Thai gives the boys and girls structure in their life, teaches them discipline and makes them physically fit. For some children from poor families, Muay Thai is their only hope. And as the director said in the Q&A session after the film, the question is whether the violence kids are exposed to in boxing is any worse than the type action they see playing video games. There's a trailer for the film, and it's embedded below.

Attack of the space slug in Salaya

Every time I visit the Thai Film Archive in Salaya, Nakhon Pathom, it seems Archive Director Dome Sukwong has added something. Perhaps another converted shipping container or two, providing much-needed housing for offices or storage.

The latest addition is another bit of movie ephemera, a prop from last year's GTH sci-fi/horror-comedy, Cool Gel Attacks (กระดึ้, Kradeub).

It's the fierce mother worm, sitting outside the Archive's Sri Salaya Theatre, which for the past 10 days has hosted the first Salaya Doc Fest. As you can see from the photos, she stands taller than a Volkswagen Beetle, but is roughly the same size as the Bug.


The prop is a piece of the practical effects that were used in the movie about the invasion of ravenous mutant space slugs. There was also a lot of CGI-animated space slugs, but for some shots this mother worm was used. At the back, there's rigging so that the mouth can be moved.

Sitting outside like it is, I'm not sure how long the prop will last. But the Thai Film Museum building is already crammed to the gills with old props and equipment, and the mother worm is such a big beast, who knows where she could fit in? Perhaps by the rainy season another shipping container will be brought in and the mother worm will find a home.

Prime Minister Abhisit shakes hands on the set of Hangover Part II

Thailand earned 1.8 billion baht ($60 million) from foreign film productions last year, according to a recent press release from Film in Thailand, quoting figures from the Department of Tourism. The earnings doubled the approximately 900 million baht from foreign film shoots in 2009.

India and Japan were the top countries sending film crews with European and South Korean productions following close behind, according to the Thailand Film Office.

The office is hoping for additional growth from promotional roadshows in Europe and Russia this year and also an inbound roadshow of studios, producers and location coordinators.

There's also incentives in the works.

The Cabinet approved the exemption of film shooting fees in areas owned by seven state offices including the Department of National Parks, Wildlife and Plant Conservation, the Department of Fine Arts, the State Railway of Thailand, the Treasury Department, the Royal Forest Department, the Royal Irrigation Department and Suvarnabhumi Airport.

More incentives approved by the Cabinet are under review by the Revenue Department. There's hope for tax breaks, which would make Thailand even more affordable for film productions.

Film Business Asia recently had a report on some of the movies being shoot in Thailand and quotes from producers. I thought it was a pretty informative and fair report.

Recent films include Elephant White, directed by Prachya Pinkaew and starring Djimon Hounsou and Kevin Bacon. There's also Luc Besson's secretive production of The Lady, the Aung San Suu Kyi biopic starring Michelle Yeoh. And Ewan McGregor has been in Phuket, filming the tsunami drama The Impossible with Naomi Watts.

But probably the biggest of these recent productions is the Hollywood comedy sequel, The Hangover Part II, which has featured a cameo by Bill Clinton (or not) and Mike Tyson in a reprise appearance.

Prime Minister Abhisit Vejjajiva visited the set last month, and Film in Thailand sent a press release about that.

By Film in Thailand

On December 29, 2010, in an auspicious sign of support for Thailand's foreign production services industry and the Department of Tourism, Thailand Film Office (Thailand's Film Commission) for the New Year ahead, Thai Prime Minister Abhisit Vejjajiva visited the set of Warner Bros' and Legendary Pictures' The Hangover Part II that was filming in Bangkok.

Welcoming PM Abhisit to the MoonStar studio was Director-General of the Department of Tourism, Mr. Supol Sripan, assigned by the Minister of Tourism and Sports, Mr. Chumpol Silapa-archa to provide primary data and information on foreign productions filming in Thailand.

Joining the Director-General were Ms. Wanasiri Morakul, Director of the Thailand Film Office, Ms. Sasisupa Sungvaribud, president of the private sector Foreign Film Production Services Association (FSA), Mr. Daniel Goldberg, Producer, Mr. Todd Phillips, Director, Mr. Chris Lowenstein, Line Producer for Thailand-based Living Films and other members of the movie cast and crew.

The Hollywood production shot 40 days in Thailand, 38 on location and two in one of MoonStar's sound stages. Approximately 500 million baht (about US$16.7 million) was spent on the production which employed more than 450 local crew and 100 Western crew who stayed at more than 12 different hotels around town. One hundred seventy-six various production vehicles were hired, including vans, trucks, cranes, motor homes, mobile toilets, mobile offices, etc.

With those assembled, the Prime Minister discussed tax incentives and rebates for foreign film productions filming in Thailand which had already passed the Thai Cabinet and were being considered for final implementation.

Thanking the Prime Minister for his support, Mr. Lowenstein encouraged him to try and have the incentives fully approved by May 26, 2011. May 26th being the day The Hangover Part II will be released worldwide – right after the Cannes Film Festival, May 11-21, and right before the Association of Film Commissioners location show in Los Angeles, June 3-5.

The Prime Minister liked the idea of setting a specific date and using the movie's worldwide release date as a marketing platform for promoting Thailand's locations and production services industry.

Trailer for Eternity (Tee Rak)

There's now a trailer for Sivaroj Kongsakul's Eternity (ที่รัก, Tee Rak), the indie drama that's among the Thai films at this year's International Film Festival Rotterdam.

The trailer gives a better idea of the atmosphere of nostalgia, sweetness and sadness that I don't think any of the reviews so far have been able to evoke.

Eternity (no, not that Eternity) is in the Tiger Awards competition at IFFR, starting on Wednesday and running until February 6.

Apichatpong-a-Rama: No Uncle Boonmee for Oscars, a Singapore Q&A and an AFA nomination

The short-list of contenders for the Oscar for Best Foreign Language Film at the 83rd Academy Awards has been pared down from 66 to nine semi-finalists, and once again Thailand didn't make the cut, despite having had possibly the best chance it's had yet at an Oscar.

But then again, a movie as blissfully weird as Apichatpong Weerasethakul's Uncle Boonmee Who Can Recall His Past Lives was a long-shot to win an Oscar anyway.

Film Business Asia has a look at the Asian film that did make the short list. The final list of nominees will be announced on January 25.

At In Contention, Oscar prognosticator Guy Lodge gave Boonmee a chance:

This is where I’m guessing the executive committee makes its presence felt. Apichatpong Weerasethakul’s meditative, Palme d’Or-winning reincarnation fantasy is revered by numerous critics, but is surely too languid and left-of-center to impress the general voters — leaving the smaller group to shoehorn it into the list for credibility points. (Not to mention geographical balance: no other Asian title looks likely to feature.)

Steve Pond at The Wrap's Odds column also offered his predictions:

Magical, strange, funny, perplexing and boring, Uncle Boonmee is a reverie that encompasses life and death, the spirit world and strange characters in monkey costumes. I get the feeling that while many critics loved it, and Tim Burton's Cannes jury flipped for it, it's just too weird, in an arty but narratively unfulfilling way, for Oscar voters. ("The emperor's new clothes" is a phrase I heard.) Unless the executive committee finds that Palme d'Or awfully persuasive, I suspect this'll supply this year's "how dare they not nominate it!" controversy.

Pond later stated: "I get the sense that there is no chance at all for the other oddball critics' favorite, Thailand's Uncle Boonmee Who Can Recall His Past Lives."

Boonmee, meanwhile, makes most of the lists in the Senses of Cinema 2010 World Poll.

You can hear Apichatpong talk about his film in the Q&A session after last weekend's charity screening of Uncle Boonmee to benefit the Asian Film Archive in Singapore. Click over to A Nutshell Review to watch the videos or see this playlist (embedded below).

Update: Uncle Boonmee Who Can Recall His Past Lives was nominated for best film at the Asian Film Awards. Top nominees are Japan's Oscar submission (and possible nominee) Confessions and China's Let the Bullets Fly.

Update 2: Singapore's MovieXclusive has a review of Uncle Boonmee.

Update 3: Twitch's Todd Brown thought Uncle Boonmee was a significant omission from the Oscars list.

Sahamongkol gathers top directors for horror quartet Lud 4 Lud

Chookiat Sakveerakul, Kongkiat Khomsiri and Phawit Panangkasiri bring their own styles to stories scripted or co-scripted by thriller writer Ekkasith Thairath, who rounds out the foursome with a directorial debut of his own in Sahamongkol Film International's horror omnibus Lud See Lud (หลุดสี่หลุด or หลุด 4 หลุด).

Eakasith, writer of such films as 13 Beloved, Body #19 and Who R U, offers Grian Laang Lok (เกรียน ล้าง โลก, a.k.a. Clean-Up Day), a short-but-sweet teaser to start things off. Alexander Rendel, the young actor who starred in Chookiat's 2004 debut feature Evil (Pisaj), stars, playing one of a group of guys hanging out and talking about a virus to end the world.

Kongkiat, who previously helmed Five Star's Slice, Muay Thai Chaiya and had a hand in the Art of the Devil series, directs the darkly comic Ran Kong Kwan Peua Kon Tee Kun Gliat (ร้าน ของขวัญ เพื่อ คน ที่ คุณ เกลียด , The Gift Shop for the Ones You Hate). It stars "Boy" Pakorn Chatborirak as an office worker who's just been promoted to manager, and he receives some congratulatory gifts that aren't all that nice.

Phawit, directing Keun Jit Lut (คืน จิต หลุด, Eerie Nights) brings the same film-noir touch as in last year's Buddhist crime thriller Nak Prok (Shadow of the Naga) in a similar tale of three criminals – led by Ananda Everingham, still in his angry bad-ass Red Eagle mode – on the run from the cops. Bad karma eventually catches up.

And 13 Beloved and Love of Siam director Chukiat directs the colorful all-out comedy segment Hoo Aa Gong (ฮู อา กง), about a wacky Thai-Chinese family dealing with the spirit of their grandfather, who on his deathbed asked that his corpse be preserved "until ..."

There's an English-subtitled trailer at the Sahamongkol Media channel and it's embedded below.

Lud 4 Lud, a.k.a The 4 Movie (for now anyway), hits Thai cinemas on Thursday.

Hi-So, Terrorists in Berlinale Forum

Two Thai films are in this year's Forum program announced yesterday by the Berlin International Film Festival, The Terrorists by Thunska Pansittivorakul and Hi-So by Aditya Assarat.

Making its world premiere is The Terrorists (ผู้ก่อการร้าย, Poo Kor Karn Rai). Thunska's film is produced by Jürgen Brüning, the German producer who's been behind films by controversial director Bruce La Bruce, such as Otto; or, Up with Dead People and L.A. Zombie.

With Thunska's now-trademark explosive combination of political commentary and young men in their underwear briefs, The Terrorists "is dedicated to the deceased and the wounded in the crackdowns on the protesters in Thailand from April 10th-May 19th, 2010 – the number of victims is believed to exceed 2,000 – as well as to those Red Shirts who were assassinated after the incident. Abhisit Vejjajiva's government shall be condemned for its continuing demolition of our country and for its lies and slander of its own people. We curse those who are behind the massacre in the middle of the capital."

As with Thunska's previous film, last year's Reincarnate, he has no expectations of releasing the movie in Thailand – a tact he's taken since his 2008 film This Area Is Under Quarantine was disallowed from screening at the 2009 World Film Festival of Bangkok.

There's more about The Terrorists at ThaiIndie.com and at the film's blog.

Aditya's Hi-So makes its European premiere at the Berlinale. The indie romance starring Ananda Everingham premiered at last year's Pusan fest and later screened at the Tokyo International Film Festival.

(Via Film Business Asia)

Watch this: Kissing in Public

Embedded above is Kissing in Public, a short film done by Anocha Suwichakornpong and her crew at Electric Eel Films.

It was posted to what appears to be a semi-official YouTube channel nearly two years ago. Hopefully it'll be okay to embed here now.

Although it's from 2009, it seems relevant today, given the controversy over the trailer for Love Julinsee, a sweet-looking teen romance that got Thai censors all hot and bothered. They apparently think kids who watch the trailer will immediately go out and copy the moves. They start out kissing, and who knows what that will lead to.

In the trailer, the editors coyly cut away at the last moment so that the offending smooches aren't actually shown, but the censors want them cut anyway.

Anocha's film has full-on snogging, in public, by same-sex couples. They are in the streets, outside the shopping mall, in Chinatown and at the railway terminal. A few passersby stop and wonder. But no one's giving the smoochers a hairy eyeball. It seems like hardly anyone cares, despite that, from what I've been led to understand, public displays of affection are generally frowned upon in Thai society.

There can be hand holding by young same-sex pairs, generally just friends, passing the time of day as they walk on the footpath. But not by romantic couples, and definitely no hugging or kissing.

Thailand is a weird place that's full of confusing contradictions. Society is conservative. Courtship and marriage rituals are highly formalized. Yet there are go-go clubs, massage parlors and other venues for prostitution, even though prostitution is illegal.

And now there are people making films, in public, with people kissing. What will that lead to?

(Via Limitless Cinema)

Chua Fah Din Salai locks up Kom Chad Luek Awards

Chua Fah Din Salai (Eternity), the lavish period romantic drama by ML Bhandevanop "Mom Noi" Devakula and starring Ananda Everingham and "Ploy" Chermarn Boonyasak, swept the top prizes for film in the 8th Kom Chad Luek Awards on Thursday night at the Bangkok Convention Center at Central Plaza Lat Phrao.

Mom Noi's return to filmmaking after a 13-year hiatus, Chua Fah Din Salai won prizes for best movie, director and screenplay. Stars Ananda and Ploy were awarded for their roles as the iconic cheating young lovers, chained together for eternity. It was the top nominee, having had eight nods across the seven categories.

Based on a 1943 novel by Malai Choopinit, the steamy Chua Fah Din Salai was a summer box-office hit. Mom Noi released a director's cut last month. An hour longer and more explicit than the original release, Eternity: Director's Cut was to play for just two weeks at Bangkok's House cinema, but its run was extended when audiences turned out in droves to watch it.

Other best-movie nominees included Apichatpong Weerasethakul's Uncle Boonmee Who Can Recall His Past Lives, Uruphong Rakasad's Agrarian Utopia and Mundane History by Anocha Suwichakornpong – all independent films that only had limited releases in Thailand during 2010. Apichatpong and Uruphong were also up for best director and Mundane was a best-screenplay nominee.

Ananda was a double nominee for best actor, also standing for his dark anti-hero turn in Wisit Sasanatieng's The Red Eagle, which was also a nominee for best movie, director and screenplay.

Ananda's Eternity co-star Ploy also won a best-actress trophy for her role in the TV drama Rabam Duang Dao.

Also scoring many acting nominations was Nak Prok (Shadow of the Naga), the controversial "monks-with-guns" crime drama. It was up for best actor, supporting actor (two nods) and supporting actress. "Sai" Inthira Charoenpura won for her portrayal of a greedy, back-stabbing prostitute while veteran actor Sa-ad Piampongsan took the supporting-actor trophy for his role as a wise elderly monk with hidden motives. Two of the movie's trio of bank robbers to don monk's robes, lead actor Somchai Kemklad and supporting actor Ray MacDonald, were also nominated.

The child actors in GTH's The Little Comedian received nominations as well.

And GTH's South Korean travel romance Guan Muen Ho (Hello Stranger) was voted most popular movie.

The Kom Chad Luek Awards, organized by the mass-circulation Thai-language daily newspaper in the Nation Multimedia Group, also gives prizes for music and TV shows.

Lyn's Lakorn Blog has more on the ceremony.

Here's the list of nominees and winners of the film prizes:

Best movie

WINNER – Chua Fah Din Salai (Eternity), ML Bhandevanop Devakula (Sahamongkol Film International)

• Lung Boonmee Raluek Chat (Uncle Boonmee Who Can Recall His Past Lives), Apichatpong Weerasethakul (Kick the Machine)
• Rao Song Sam Khon (That Sounds Good), "Leo" Kittikorn Liawsirikul (M-Thirtynine)
• Sawan Baan Na (Agrarian Utopia), Uruphong Raksasad (Extra Virgin Company)
• Insee Dang (The Red Eagle), Wisit Sasanatieng (Five Star Production)

Best Director

WINNER – ML Bhandevanop Devakula, Chua Fah Din Salai (Eternity)

• Apichatpong Weerasethakul, Lung Boonmee Raluek Chat (Uncle Boonmee Who Can Recall His Past Lives
• "Leo" Kittikorn Liawsirikul, Rao Song Sam Kon (That Sounds Good)
• Uruphong Raksasad, Sawan Baan Na (Agrarian Utopia)
• Wisit Sasanatieng, Insee Dang (The Red Eagle)

Best Screenplay

WINNER – Chua Fah Din Salai (Eternity), ML Bhandevanop Devakula

• Rak Tee Ror Koi (October Sonata), Somkiet Vituranich
• Lung Boonmee Raluek Chat (Uncle Boonmee Who Can Recall His Past Lives, Apichatpong Weerasethakul
• Insee Dang (The Red Eagle), Wisit Sasanatieng
• Jok Nok Krajok (Mundane History), Anocha Suwichakornpong

Best Actor

WINNER – Ananda Everingham, Eternity

• Somchai Kemklad, Nak Prok (Shadow of the Naga)
• Chawin Likitjareonpong, Baan Chan ... Talok Wai Gon (Por Son Wai) (The Little Comedian)
• Thongpoom Siriphiphat, Yaak Dai Yin Wah Rak Kan (Best Supporting Actor)
• Ananda Everingham, The Red Eagle

Best Actress

WINNER – "Ploy" Chermarn Boonyasak, Chua Fah Din Salai (Eternity)

• Rattanrat Eertaweekul, Rao Song Sam Khon (That Sounds Good)
• Lakkana Wattanawongsiri, Namtan Daeng (Brown Sugar)
• Neungtida Sophon, Guan Muen Ho (Hello Stranger)
• Pimchanok Luevisetpaibool, Sing Lek Lek Thee Riak Wa … Ruk (First Love)

Best Supporting Actor

WINNER: Sa-ad Piampongsan, Nak Prok (Shadow of the Naga)

• Pitsanu Nimsakul, Rak Tee Ror Koi (October Sonata)
• Ray MacDonald, Nak Prok (Shadow of the Naga)
• Teerapong Leowrakwong, Chua Fah Din Salai (Eternity)
• Sakkaraj Rerkthamrong, Chua Fah Din Salai (Eternity)

Best supporting actress

WINNER: Inthira Charoenpura, Nak Prok (Shadow of the Naga)

• Kanya Rattapetch, Krai ... Nai Hong (Who R U)
• Ramita Mahapreukpong, Rao Song Sam Khon (That Sounds Good)
• Nichapat Jaruratnawaree, Baan Chan ... Talok Wai Gon (Por Son Wai) (The Little Comedian)
• Daraneenuch Pothipithi, Chua Fah Din Salai (Eternity)

The trailer that got Thai censors all hot and bothered

Thai censors clearly aren't getting enough love.

Why else would they be so upset by a trailer for a sweet teen romance film?

See it for yourself, which at this writing is still on YouTube and embedded above.

Thailand's cultural watchdogs aren't getting kissed, or possibly have never been kissed, and are so jealous of the smooching teenage actors in the teaser for Love Julinsee that they have asked studio M-Thirtynine to remove the offending lip bump.

Even though you never actually see them kiss. Each time the couples move to lock lips, the editor cuts away at the last second.

But whatever.

According to an item in yesterday's Bangkok Post (page 2 print edition), the censors deemed the trailer inappropriate because of the kissing teenagers in school uniform. They asked that the scene be removed.

Studio M-Thirtynine said it would comply. Love Julinsee (รักมันใหญ่มาก, Rak Man Yai Mak, literally translated by The Nation's Soopsip today as "giant love bacteria"), is set for release in March.

The clampdown shows that even innocent teenage love makes Thailand's censors squeamish. No wonder they banned the explicitly kinky Insects in the Backyard outright.

Thailand's blogging guru Richard Barrow points out the ridiculousness of the censors' decision in a post yesterday:

Sometimes I think that the Thai censor board have their priorities all wrong. Every night, in the Thai soap operas, we get scenes of men hitting and even raping women and then finally marrying them as if that made it alright. But, according to the Bangkok Post this morning, a brief shot of two teenagers, who are seen in a movie trailer about to kiss, is too immoral for our youth to watch. Their lips don’t even touch but the Office of Cultural Promotion want this cut from the trailer. Presumably, also from the yet-to-be released movie.

Read the rest for more of Richard's thoughts.

The kissing might be allowed in the movie, if it's rated 15+ or 18+.

Part of the problem is that all trailers in Thai cinemas are shown to general audiences. So you'll get a trailer for a blood-and-guts action movie shown before Doreamon or something else mostly kiddies are going to see. Under Hollywood's MPAA system, all trailers are rated as well as the movies, and the studios try to package the trailers according to the intended audiences of the main features. Not much care is given to what movies the trailers are shown with here in Thailand.

But rating the trailers, rather than censoring them, takes more work and more nuance. And Thailand's cultural minders haven't really gotten the hang of rating movies yet. They are still in censorship mode.

Update: Lyn's Lakorn Blog also has comments on this issue.

Apichatpong-a-rama: Quattro Hong Kong 2, Heterdox Award nomination

Apichatpong Weerasethakul has joined Filipino director Brillante Mendoza, Malaysia's Ho Yuhang and Hong Kong's Stanley Kwan in contributing segments to Quattro Hong Kong 2, an omnibus project commissioned by Brand Hong Kong and produced by the Hong Kong International Film Festival Society.

The film will have its world premiere at the 35th Hong Kong International Film Festival, running March 20 to April 5.

Quattro Hong Kong was inaugurated last year with contributions by Clara Law, Fruit Chan, Herman Yau and Heiward Mak. The omnibus also screened at the Taipei Film Festival, Cinema Digital Seoul and the Venice Film Festival.

So this year's Quattro project is expanded to include celebrated Southeast Asian directors – Apichatpong, riding high on his Palme d'Or win at last year's Cannes Film Festival for Uncle Boonmee Who Can Recall His Past Lives; Mendoza, the Cannes best director winner for 2009’s Kinatay; and Ho Yuhang, whose At the End of Daybreak surprised the heck out of me at the World Film Festival of Bangkok.

The Quattro 2 shorts are all being made in Hong Kong, says Jacob Wong, Hong Kong International Film Festival programmer.

Wong enthuses in a press statement released yesterday:

"Hong Kong is an amazing city – physically beautiful and psychologically complex. This omnibus series has been getting a very warm reception from audiences and participating filmmakers worldwide. Both Brillante and Stanley have finished shooting, and Apichatpong has just wrapped today. We are really looking forward to seeing the results, especially when this time we have three very exciting directors from Southeast Asia."

In other recent news, Uncle Boonmee is a nominee for the inaugural Heterodox Award in the Cinema Eye Honors at the Museum of the Moving Image. The new Heterdox Award is sponsored by Filmmaker Magazine.

The other nominees are Pedro Gonzalez-Rubio’s Alamar, Matt Porterfield’s Putty Hill, Michelangelo Frammartino’s Le Quattro Volte and Lena Dunham’s Tiny Furniture.

Here's the obligatory blurbs:

Filmmaker Magazine is “honored to celebrate with Cinema Eye the five narrative films this year that have most adventurously burst through the boundaries separating art and life,” said editor Scott Macaulay.

Cinema Eye co-chair Esther Robinson stated: “Filmmakers have always been at the forefront of raising important questions about the construction of truth, but the borders between fiction and non-fiction film are both slippery and oft times guarded with provincial and outmoded thinking.” The Heterodox Award “hopes to puncture this border, by honoring a narrative film that best illuminates the beauty and importance of creating new territories of cinema - inhabitable by both fiction and nonfiction films alike.”

Boonmee is already nominated for the Independent Spirit Awards and on January 20 we could learn whether it made the short list for the Academy Awards.

As a reminder, Apichatpong will be in Singapore this weekend for a charity screening for Uncle Boonmee to benefit the Asian Film Archive.

And Uncle Boonmee Who Can Recall His Past Lives is set for the inaugural Lifescapes South East Asian Film Festival put on by Payap University in Chiang Mai. It'll be the hometown premiere for the Chiang Mai-based filmmaker. Lifescapes runs from February 3 to 6 at the city's Major Cineplex branch.

Thai audiences charmed by romances in 2010

Once again, GTH made the No. 1 Thai movie at the box office. Media giant GMM Grammy's movie studio followed up the success of 2009's Bangkok Traffic (Love) Story with the South Korean travel romance Guan Muen Ho (Hello Stranger), earning 131 million baht.

That was followed by another youth-oriented romance, Sahamongkol's Sing Lek Lek Thee Riak Wa … Ruk (First Love), the sweet story of an awkward high-school girl who goes from ugly duckling to beauty queen. It was a surprisingly sweet summer sleeper hit that gave Guan Muen Ho a run for its money.

Here's the top 11 Thai films at the box office in 2010:

1. Guan Meun Ho (กวน มึน โฮ, Hello Stranger) – 131 million baht
2. Sing Lek Lek Thee Riak Wa … Ruk (สิ่งเล็กๆ ที่เรียกว่า...รัก, First Love) – 80 million baht
3. Saranae Sip Lor (สาระแนสิบล้อ, literally "Saranae 10 wheeler") – 70 million baht
4. Tukky Jao Ying Kai Kob (ตุ๊กกี้เจ้าหญิงขายกบ, literally "Tukky, the princess who sold frogs") – 67 million baht
5. Baan Chan ... Talok Wai Gon (Por Son Wai) (บ้านฉัน...ตลกไว้ก่อน (พ่อสอนไว้), The Little Comedian) – 50 million baht
5. Po Taek (โป๊ะแตก) – 50 million baht
7. Ong Bak 3 (องค์บาก 3) – 46 million baht.
8. Luangphee Teng 3 (หลวงพี่เท่ง 3 รุ่นฮา เขย่าโลก, The Holy Man 3) – 37 million baht
9. Nak Prok (นาคปรก, Shadow of the Naga) – 36 million baht
10. Chua Fah Din Salai (ชั่วฟ้าดินสลาย, Eternity) – 35 million baht
11. Tai Hong (ตายโหง, Still, a.k.a. Die a Violent Death) – 31.43 million baht

Popularity-wise, according to the ABAC Poll Research Center, the favorite movie of last year was Sing Lek Lek with a 19.2% share, followed by Guan Muen Ho with 18.3%. Ubiquitous comedienne Tukky and her fairytale frog-princess movie were in third place with 11.2%. Phranakorn's monastic comedy Luangphee Teng 3 was fourth at 9% and rounding out the top five was the lush period romantic melodrama Chua Fah Din Salai with 7.5%

Of 2010's 11 top-grossing films, seven were released by market leader Sahamongkol Film International, two were by GTH (Guan Muen Ho and The Little Comedian) and two by Phranakorn (Luangphee Teng 3 and Tai Hong).

Most were romance or comedies, the exceptions being the controversial "monks with guns" crime thriller Nak Prok, Tony Jaa's martial-arts drama Ong-Bak 3 – released in the midst of Bangkok's red-shirt protests – and the horror shorts compilation Tai Hong.

So the action and horror genres aren't completely dead. Yet.

But with Thai audiences eating up the romance films for the past couple of years, the studios will be increasingly formula-driven and offer more and more of those in 2011.


(Via Lyn's Lakorn Blog)

Review: Yes or No? So, I Love You

• Directed by Sarasawadee Wongsompetch
• Starring Sucharat Manaying, Supanat Jittaleela
• Released in Thai cinemas on December 16, 2010; rated 15+
• Wise Kwai's rating: 3/5

Cloyingly cute and so light it's almost inconsequential, Yes or No, Yak Rak Kor Rak Loei (Yes or No อยากรัก ก็รักเลย, also Yes or No, So I Love You) is distinguished from most other youth-oriented romantic comedies by being "that lesbian film".

Beneath the surface there are at least a couple of meaningful messages. One is that love is pretty confusing, even moreso if you are unsure of your sexuality. The other is that entering into a relationship takes courage, and you need double the usual amount of bravery if such a relationship goes against what is deemed normal.

The girly-type girl is Pie, a sweet college co-ed who's just moved into her dorm room. While she's taking a shower, her roommate comes in. Upon leaving the bathroom, the towel-wrapped Pie is surprised by the new arrival, who looks like a young man. Then a cockroach runs over the short-haired person's foot and the "guy" screams like a girl, and jumps into the arms of the terry-cloth swaddled Pie.

The tomboy's name is Kim, and Pie doesn't like her. She lays a line of red tape down the middle of the room, one that Kim shall not pass.

But eventually the roommates become friends, bonding over meals Kim prepares in her rice cooker. Kim serenades Pie with her ukulele and these best friends forever pass the time playing shadow puppets. Tentative friendship gradually becomes something more, and that red line is ignored as the roommates' two beds are pushed together.


Both hold out, though, on the question of whether they are gay. Kim swears she's not a "tom" even as she gives Pie long, significant, puppy-dog-eye glances.

The first half of Yes or No clips along at an enjoyable and humor-filled pace. There's the stock stereotypical supporting characters, like a wise-cracking effeminate gay male friend and a weird girl named Nerd who steals scenes in her strange, quiet way. Pie has a bland boyfriend who wishes he could be more to her. The slower-paced melodramatic last half is filled with tears, misunderstandings involving a pushy "dee"-type lesbian neighbor girl and running in the rain.

As with the celebrated gay-teen romantic drama Love of Siam, Yes or No has a parental figure disapproving of the relationship. The finger-wagging mother is there to raise the stakes for the two girls and act as a surrogate for Thailand's cultural watchdogs who worry about the immorality and disturbance to public order that films might pose. Who knows, without that disapproving mother to give her little speech, everyone who watches Yes or No might turn gay and bring Thai society to ruin.

So it's up to Pie and Kim to show they have the courage to go against that message. But will they? Yes or no?


Previous posts:

• Are they or aren't they? Yes or no?