For 90 minutes last Sunday evening, I sat in front of a microphone and made the odd grunt every now and then while Changkui host Passakorn Hongsyok and guest Rikker Dokkum from Thai 101 spoke about my list of the top 10 Thai films of the 2009.
The resulting podcast, Changkui in English Episode 8, is now up, and can be downloaded.
While we recorded, Hong's two boys played with Lego blocks and watched the Fantastic Four, which looked like more fun, despite the fine company I had at the table.
Breaking down the top 10 list, five have made it DVD in Thailand since their cinema runs: Meat Grinder, Phobia 2, Wongkumlao, Nymph and Slice. Of those, only Phobia 2 has reached English-friendly DVD. There's still hope for Meat Grinder, Nymph and Slice in the coming year, with more festival screenings possible. I doubt the comedy Wongkumlao will ever be released for non-Thai-speaking audiences to enjoy, which is too bad.
Two others, Mundane History and Agrarian Utopia, were shown in film festivals in Thailand last year, and will likely see at least a limited theatrical release in Bangkok this year. Cross your fingers and wish hard enough, you might get a DVD of those two.
Colors of Our Hearts will be making its way around to screenings organized for refugees, migrant laborers and advocacy groups after screening last year on World Refugee Day in Chiang Mai and at the World Film Festival of Bangkok. Perhaps the Friends Without Borders group will eventually make the movie available on DVD through its magazine.
I still don't know anything about when the made-for-television short-film anthology Sawasdee Bangkok might air or if it has already.
This Area Is Under Quarantine is banned, never to be seen.
Despite our best efforts to confine the topic to my list of the 10 best Thai feature films I saw last year, the conversation went off the rails a bit at the end, with a shout-out for the Southeast Asian Movie Theater Project, which will soon be wrapping its run.
Again, the podcast is can be downloaded for listening on MP3.
