Review: Buppha Arigato

• Written and directed by Yuthlert Sippapak
• Starring Supassara Thanachat, Charlie Potjes, Chalermpon Thikampornteerawong, Yok Teeranitayatarn, Aphichan Chaleumchainuwong, Thana Wityasuranan, Triwarat Chutiwatkhachorachai, Navin Yavapolkul
• Released in Thai cinemas on May 5, 2016; rated 18+
• Wise Kwai's rating: 3/5

Yuthlert Sippapak is one of the Thai film industry's more distinctive and prolific directors. His signature move is to throw all kinds of ideas into the blender and then somehow assemble them as mostly coherent films that I have more or less enjoyed over the years.

After a bit of a hiatus, he's back at it with Buppha Arigato (บุปผาอาริกาโตะ, a.k.a. Buppha Rahtree: A Haunting in Japan).

Not only does it blend the horror, comedy and romantic-drama genres, it's also an Asian cultural mix, with a blood-and-slapstick story about a Thai musician and a film crew visiting a winter resort in Japan, where they are haunted by Japanese-style ghosts as well as the ghost of a spurned young Thai woman. I also couldn't help but feel a bit of John Carpenter vibe, with perhaps a nod to Halloween.

Additionally, it is trading on a combination of well-known Thai movies, tying in with Yuthlert's own Buppha Rahtree franchise of ghost comedy-horrors and the hit 2003 film Fan Chan (แฟนฉัน, a.k.a. My Girl). The bulk of the cast are the boys from Fan Chan, all grown up, including that film's lead actor Charlie Potjes along with the schoolyard bully, Chalermpon "Jack" Thikampornteerawong. It's the first time all the guys have been reunited onscreen since they were children.

The story follows the familiar template of the Buppha Rahtree films, which dealt with the ghost of a vengeful heartbroken young woman haunting an apartment building, and mined comedy from the colorful procession of police, priests and shamans who are recruited to perform exorcisms.

Buppha Arigato changes things up by having the action take place in a rental lodge at a picturesque Japanese ski resort. And instead of one ghost, there are several. The most lethal is a knife-wielding mother and her creepy little boy, spirits of a family who stayed in the house years before but could not pay their rent.

Meanwhile, there's a young Thai woman named Buppha who comes to the resort on a solo trip to mend her broken heart. Seems she caught her boyfriend having sex with another woman. Somehow, she has passed away but her soul is hanging on at the lodge, and is drawn to Charlie and his crew because Charlie looks a bit like her cheating ex.

The lodge's shady landlord, a Thai expat portrayed by "Tar" Navin Yavapolkul, is aware of his property's status as a haunted house, and he has various clergymen brought in to get rid of the bad spirits. Among the bumbling exorcists is a Thai Buddhist monk who is hung over after having too much beer and a sake bomb the night before. His saffron robe is accessorized by expensive sunglasses and a designer handbag, reflecting an actual controversy about a jet-setting monk in Thai religious society. Later, a Thai Hindu priest takes a crack at the spirits. Neither are successful at much except getting plenty of laughs.

So it's up to Charlie, Jack and the rest of the gang to solve the mystery of why the ghosts are haunting the place.

It's a chance for the former child actor Charlie to stretch his dramatic chops, and to show his talent as an indie singer-songwriter. He gets an extended scene during the closing credits, with a stylishly shot close up of just him, his tenor voice and acoustic guitar.

Jack, now a ubiquitous TV personality and commercial pitchman, gets to play director, heading up the film unit that is comprised of other four other now-grown child actors from Fan Chan, namely Yok Teeranitayatarn, Aphichan Chaleumchainuwong, Thana Wityasuranan, Triwarat Chutiwatkhachorachai.

There is a passing of the torch, with former Buppha Ratree actress "Ploy" Chermarn Boonyasak putting in a cameo in a limbo dream sequence, and offering guidance to new-face actress Supassara Thanachat, who takes over the role.

But the real hero of Buppha Arigato is of course Yuthlert's long-time collaborator, actor and veteran film-industry hand Adirek "Uncle" Watleela, again playing a police officer as he has throughout the franchise, and in other films. Here, he's a Japanese cop, but helpfully speaks Thai, and he comes up with an unusual way of defeating the ghosts, involving the use of an umbrella and the Thai military's infamous divining-rod-like GT-200 "bomb detector".

Also, all the guys are required to strip down to their tighty-whitie underwear briefs, so at least these young emperors have a shred of dignity.

In Thai cinemas: Luang Phee Jazz 4G

It's holiday time in Thailand, with today's Chakri Memorial Day kicking off anticipatory celebrations of next week's Songkran Thai New Year, which is a three-day public holiday from next Wednesday to Friday.

In the cinemas, the big Thai tentpole is the Songkran-flavored Luang Phee Jazz 4G (หลวงพี่แจ๊ส 4G, a.k.a. Joking Jazz 4G). It's about a bespectacled, gauge-eared, tattooed hipster with a checkered past who is hiding out as a monk at an isolated mountaintop temple. He's played by hipster comedian Phadung “Jazz Chuanchuen” Songsang. He and his temple-boy friends have an adventure as they are sent to Bangkok on a mission during Songkran.

Directed by Poj Arnon, Luang Pee Jazz 4G is the first release under the prolific producer-director's rebooted Film Guru production marque, which has been relaunched in a new partnership with Major Cineplex, the Kingdom's biggest movie-theater chain.

Poj and Film Guru were formerly associated with Phranakorn Film, a film studio owned by the Thana Cineplex chain of upcountry cinemas. Phranakorn released a string of hit country comedies in the early 2000s, including the original Luang Phee (Holy Man) movie in 2005.

Originated by comedian, actor and director Note Chernyim, the first Luang Phee Teng starred ubiquitous comedian and TV host Pongsak "Theng Terdterng" Pongsuwan as a former street hood who has entered the monkhood and ministers to colorful residents in a provincial town

 Other Luang Phee Teng installments followed in 2008 and 2010, with rapper Joey Boy and actor-musician Krissada Sukosol Clapp taking respective turns as the saffron-clad lead character. As each movie stands alone, with different characters in the lead, they aren't really sequels but are part of a franchise all the same.

The Nation had more on this latest Luang Phee movie, which is the fourth in the series.

Still hanging around after being released a week ago is the anthology horror 11 12 13 Rak Kan Ja Tai (11 12 13 รักกันจะตาย a.k.a. Ghost Is All Around).

Directed by Saravuth Wichiansarn (Ghost Game), it is released by M-Thirtynine, another film-production company that is partnered with Major Cineplex.

The stories will sound familiar if you watch a lot of these Thai horror anthologies – one about a guy haunted by the spirit of his suicidal girlfriend and another about goofball pals haunted by a friend who is dead but doesn't know it. A third story follows a woman who is in for terror in her travels with her gay chum. Heartthrob actor "Weir" Sukollawat Kanarot is among the stars.

As detailed over on my other blog, other movies in Thai cinemas include the Documentary Club release of All Things Must Pass: The Rise and Fall of Tower Records, which came out last week. This week's offerings include The Huntsman: Winter's War and the South Korean adventure drama The Himalayas, which is presented in the 270-degree True Cinema X at the EmQuartier mall in Bangkok.

In Thai cinemas: Awasarn Loke Suay, Krasue Kreung Khon

The year in Thai cinema commences with Awasarn Loke Suay (อวสานโลกสวย), a teen-oriented psychological drama from Kantana Motion Pictures.

Apinya Sakuljaroensuk stars as a faded Internet idol who becomes upset at being unseated by a new schoolgirl star (Napasasi Surawan). She decides to teach the naive upstart a lesson in cruelty. Pun Homcheun and Onusa Donsawai direct, adapting a short film of the same name.

In a gimmick to gin up publicity, there are two versions – rated 18+ and the “uncut” 20-

And there's another Thai film to start 2016 – veteran actor-director Bin Banluerit's horror-comedy
Krasue Kreung Khon (กระสือครึ่งคน) – which has a jungle tribe of dwarfs being terrorized by the notorious krasue, the female ghost of Southeast Asian folklore that’s a floating vampiric head and entrails. It's a mainstream release, from Sahamongkol.



New releases in Thai cinemas this week include the Oscar-nominated 45 Years from upstart indie distributor HAL Film, which made its debut last year with the release of the offbeat foreign indies White God and The Tribe. And, oddly, the Documentary Club is releasing a dramatic feature, that iPhone movie", Tangerine. Shows the possibilities for doc filmmaking, I suppose.

Upcoming events to mention include the Bangkok Art and Culture Center's Cinema Diverse: Directors' Choice series, which wraps up on February 6 with a screening of the Chilean drama No hosted by Apichatpong Weerasethakul, Thailand's most-celebrated filmmaker. He and film critic Kong Rithdee will talk about the movie afterward, with translation in English. Registration opens at 4.30pm with seating on a first-come, first-served basis.

Still more events this year include the Goethe-Institut and Thai Film Archive's Wim Wenders Retrospective, which will include Wings of Desire outdoors at Lumpini Park in February and a 3D screening of Pina at the Archive in March. There's also the Salaya International Documentary Film Festival in March, the Archive's travelling Memories fest in April, the Silent Film Festival of Thailand in June and the Thai Short Film and Video Festival in August.

LPFF 2015 reviews: Above It All, The Search for Weng Weng

Above It All (ນ້ອຍ) – It's the story of two people named Noy who want the freedom to love the way they want to love, not the way society says they should love. One is a gay medical student who has yet to come out of the closet to his parents and the girlfriend from a wealthy family they want him to marry. The other Noy is a Hmong college student who wants to buck eons-old tribal traditions and marry someone of her own choosing, not some stranger her father has found.

Outside of Laos, it'll be hard to explain why Above It All is so gosh-darned groundbreaking. But it is the first Lao feature film to specifically address homosexuality. The Hmong angle is interesting as well. I'm just not sure the two taboo love stories work together, as one might cancel out the potential audience for the other.

Much anticipated in certain circles, Above It All is the sophomore feature from Anysay Keola of the Lao New Wave Cinema collective, who debuted in 2012 with the astonishing thriller At the Horizon. It's best to keep your expectations in check. With Above It All, Anysay seems to have made a conscious stylistic choice to make his movie just like the Lao PDR's public-service and propaganda videos. The performances are old-fashionedly wooden and emotionally flat. The pacing is frustratingly slow. At one point during the film's world premiere as the official opener of the sixth Luang Prabang Film Festival, I could sense the audience's impatience, and folks were murmuring, "go on, kid, tell your dad you're gay." Then, a beat too late, Noy says it, "Dad, I like men." And everyone cheered. I think Lao people are ready for more of these types of films.

The lady Noy, meanwhile, has struck up a friendship with a young man in Vientiane, where she has been working as a waitress to put herself through college. In a way-too-cute coincidence, her man Sack happens to be the other Noy's rock-musician younger brother, the guy who has been a huge disappointment to his father. If only dad knew Sack's brother Noy was gay.

As she's ready to graduate from college, Noy's parents show up, and her father insists that she marry a Hmong gentleman in the U.S., whom she has never met. This is apparently a thing now among the Hmong people in Laos, in which Hmong daughters are being married off to, say, Hmong dentists in Minnesota, to support the impoverished family back home.

Above It All has its moments when it approaches the intensity of At the Horizon. Lady Noy gets to tell off a snotty restaurant customer who is badmouthing Hmong women. She receives backing from Sack. A surreal car-wreck serves to further bind the two stories together, and make the Dr. Noy a hero, possibly redeeming himself in his stubborn father's eyes. (3/5)

The Search for Weng Weng – Wearing an actual pith helmet like he's on an archaeological dig, cult-video purveyor/filmmaker Andrew Leavold descends into the heart of darkness in his obsessive quest to untangle the shrouds of myth from bleak reality in The Search for Weng Weng.

The 2013 documentary is another essential chapter from the 1970s and '80s era of exploitation filmmaking in the Philippines. It was a time the Filipino people would rather forget, so it's been left to foreigner genre-film fans to fill in the blanks. Previously, the scene was overviewed in Mark Hartley's informative and entertaining 2010 documentary Machete Maidens Unleashed!, which has since led to Not Quite Hollywood, covering Ozploitation, and the more recent Electric Boogaloo: The Wild, Untold Story of Cannon Films.

In Weng Weng, the Australian Leavold goes to the Philippines to track down clues about one of his obsessions – a 2-foot-9-inch movie star known as Weng Weng. Very nearly forgotten if not for Leavold, Weng Weng was a novelty bit player who was elevated to the level of action star in a string of early '80s spaghetti-and-hotdog westerns and Bond-movie spoofs such as D'Wild Wild Weng, Agent 00 and For Y'ur Height Only.

With the help of old-timer actors, directors, film editors and other friendly characters like "Rene the Legman", Leavold circles ever closer to the depressing truth about Weng Weng, whose tiny, childlike figure was the source of much mirth for movie-goers for just a blip in time. As a public figure, the diminutive Weng Weng (real name Ernesto de la Cruz) was built up into a larger-than-life figure. Trained in martial arts as a child, he was not only a movie star, but also a playboy with multiple girlfriends as well as a secret agent for the Marcos regime. In truth, he was a graceful martial artist, but lived a sad, lonely existence under the control of opportunistic husband-and-wife movie producers, who "adopted" Ernesto and saw him as a yardstick-sized cash cow rather than a human being.

It's full of bizarre revelations, but none are more surreal than when the documentary is hijacked by none other than the Philippines' former first lady Imelda Marcos, who draws Leavold and his band of cult-movie geeks into her rich pageant of self-aggrandizement.

Running just over 90 minutes, The Search for Weng Weng has a running time that belies the epic story of its making, which took eight years and cost Leavold mortages on his Brisbane video shop and brought him to kickstart the Kickstarter era in self-funded indie filmmaking. Such dedication definitely makes Weng Weng a doc you should order. (5/5)

Other films I've caught so far at the Luang Prabang Film Festival include Lao TV star Jear Pacific's latest hilarious horror-comedy-romance Huk Ey Ly 2 (Really Love 2). It had the audience in stitches with its Thai-TV-style slapstick. Judging from crowd response alone, it should be the winner of the festival's new audience award. But will the cheers of the Lao movie-goers translate to the clicks on a tablet screen that are supposed to be made as viewers pour out of the venue?

I was also happy to finally see the Thai country comedy Phoobao Thai Baan Isaan Indy (ผู้บ่าวไทบ้าน อีสานอินดี้), which was released in Thai cinemas last year. Made in the Northeastern Thai province of Khon Kaen, PBTB is a representative of a regional cinema movement of Isaan films that could easily be exported to Laos, to play in the new Platinum multiplex in Vientiane.

Review: Runpee (Senior)

• Written and directed by Wisit Sasanatieng
• Starring Jannine Wiegel, Phongsakon Tosuwan, Sa-ad Piampongsan
• Released in Thai cinemas on December 3, 2015; rated 15+
• Wise Kwai's rating: 4/5

After a five-year hiatus from commercial filmmaking, Wisit Sasanatieng has been coaxed back to the director's chair by the studio M-Thirtynine with Runpee (รุ่นพี่, a.k.a. Senior), an artfully directed ghost comedy that successfully merges old-fashioned horror thrills with contemporary teen romance.

Penned by Wisit, the story is about an outcast weirdo at a Catholic girls' boarding school. She has a special nose. Unlike the kid in The Sixth Sense, the olfactorily gifted girl Mon (Ploychompoo Jannine Weigel) can't see dead people, she smells them. More specifically, she can sniff out the troubled spirits who are still lurking in our realm.

Her unique talent leads her to develop a connection with a boy ghost (Bom Phongsakon Tosuwan) who was a student when the place was a business school in the 1980s, before it was a church convent. Together, they investigate a murder that occurred there some 50 years before, when the school was the palace home of a princess, who was found beaten, bloodied and very much dead in her swimming pool. Her gardener took the fall for the death, but there was more to the case than met the eye.

It's an old-timey Thai setting right out of Wisit's 2000 debut feature, Fah Talai Jone (Tears of the Black Tiger), and that western's trademark raspberry-jelly blood splatter is evident in key scenes. Runpee also has echoes of Wisit's 2006 Gothic horror Pen Choo Kub Pee (The Unseeable), plus the wry observational humour of his satiric Mah Nakorn (Citizen Dog).

With false scares and other cinematic sleight-of-hand tricks, Wisit keeps the audience guessing as he suspensefully strings along the story of Mon and her ghost friend Runpee, whose name means simply "senior".

Mon's abilities to sense ghosts has made her an outcast among her school's other girls. Everyone already thought she was a bit weird, but since Runpee came on the scene, she's especially bizarre, since she's given to carrying on conversations with her ghost pal, who almost no one except the audience can see. So it appears she's walking along, talking to herself. There are even street scenes, which I'm not certain were filmed on a closed set, in which passersby naturally react with perplexity to the odd girl who is flailing her arms and talking gibberish to an invisible friend.

At one point, Mon is talking and flailing during her French lessons, and the stern nun teacher punishes Mon by having her wear a sign and stand with her arms outstretched. Even then, she continues her conversation with Runpee.

The laws of physics are different in the ghost world, Runpee explains as they sleuth around the school property, searching for clues to the 50-year-old murder. For example, ghosts can't walk walls if the walls were built after they died. Industrial-like animated diagrams help illustrate. And, there are exceptions, of course. It's not quite Christopher Nolan's Interstellar, but then thank goodness it isn't.

Aside from the main story of the old murder case, there are other issues to pad out the tale and give weight to the characters. There's an annoyingly cheerful young doctor friend of Mon's (DJ We Raweeroj) whom Mon strings along long enough for him to be helpful to the murder case. Another subplot has Mon developing a selfie-fueled friendship with the school's other outcast, Ant (Kaykai Nutticha Namwong), who is shunned by the popular clique because she's been seen getting close to the male chemistry teacher – way too close in fact. He's a jerk, and gets what's coming to him in a vividly memorable scene that has him haunted by millions of eyeball-like CGI spirits.

Ant's story has parallels to the 50-year-old murder, which is intertwined with the school's history and the mysterious figure of "Baby Daeng", the heir to the princess' estate and the cause of conflict. What happened to Baby Daeng? That's the question that keeps coming back to haunt Mon and Runpee as they circle ever closer to a truth that was right in front of their eyes to begin with.

Figures from the past include an elderly doctor, portrayed by stage and screen veteran Sa-ad Piampongsan, who is a hoot to watch as he chews up scenes that grow meatier and meatier with each appearance.

Onward and upward, the action reaches its heights with Mon atop a bell tower, rescued by her personal Jesus Runpee.

It's a mix of actors from a bygone era of classic Thai genre films and fresh-faced youngsters making their debuts, which is something of a trademark for Wisit, who has a knack for plucking up fresh talents and dropping them in as the leads of his films.

Here, singer-actress Ploychompoo is an endearing heroine, rebellious and strong, placing her in good company with another superpowered young actress, Punpun Sutatta Udomsilp from another Thai movie this year, May Nai (May Who?), about a high-school girl who releases a strong electrical charge if her heart gets racing. Maybe one day Mon and May could team up to solve more crimes.

See also:

• Spirits and the soul [The Nation]

Related posts:

• In Thai cinemas: Keetarajanipon, Khun Thong Daeng, Runpee

In Thai cinemas: Ghost Ship, Love Arumirai

It's Halloween weekend, so studios, distributors and theater chains have all conspired to cram horror films down our throats whether we want them or not.

Along with a mixed bag of tricks that includes Scouts Guide to the Apocalypse, the nu-horror Regression and yet another Ju-on movie, there's a couple of Thai films.

Among the local offerings is Mon Son Phee (มอญซ่อนผี, a.k.a. Ghost Ship), which has venerable Thai studio Five Star Production getting back into the water.

Set aboard a cargo ship, the story plays on that ancient nautical notion that women are bad luck at sea, and the superstitious crew have much to fear when they find the corpse of the captain's wife boxed up in the hold. Spooky stuff starts happening as the boat heads into a storm.

It's the feature debut by Achira Nokthet, who previously served as an art director on Tanwarin Sukkhapisit's It Gets Better and the horror-comedy films of Poj Arnon (he even helmed a segment of Poj's Tai Hong Tai Hian).

Sean Jindachote stars, along with Phuwadon Wetchawongsa, Akkarin Akaranithimetrath and gay-film cult actor "Fluke" Pongsatorn Sripinta.

The other Thai entry in local cinemas is Love Arumirai, which seems to be taking a page from the recent Amazon series Red Oaks, which had an honest-to-goodness body-swap episode.

The story has to do with the seven-year marriage between Geng (Phisanu Nimsakul) and fashion model Bella (Cheeranat Yusanon) turning stormy. The bickering husband and wife face their toughest test yet when they wake up one morning and get a shock when they go to the mirror.

Seree Phongnithi is the screenwriter on this feature from start-up shingle Munwork Production.



Apart from the spooky offerings, Thailand's new Documentary Club offers a demonstration of counter-programming that is also complementary, bringing in the Oscar-winning 2008 documentary Man on Wire, which is the story behind the death-defying 1974 high-wire stunt by Philippe Petit at New York's World Trade Center. It's a slice of history that has made a comeback thanks to Robert Zemeckis' The Walk, which is a dramatization of Petit and his stunt. But while the phobia-inducing 3D camerawork of The Walk earned accolades, the movie bombed at the box office and was slapped by a backlash from critics, who urged viewers to instead seek out Man on Wire.

That new release and others are covered at the other blog.

Guest post: How Thai is Freelance aka Heart Attack?

Freelance (a.k.a. Heart Attack), the latest GTH film and the first big-studio directorial effort for indie filmmaker  Nawapol Thamrongrattanarit, seems likely to be one of the best films of the year, and will likely also be among the winners at the Thai box office, with reported earnings of 73.5 million baht as of last weekend. While releases in neighboring countries are already planned, guest columnist Lila Ahronowitz takes a look at the broader, cross-cultural appeal of Freelance ... Ham Puay Ham Phak Ham Rak More (ฟรีแลนซ์.. ห้ามป่วย ห้ามพัก ห้ามรักหมอ).

In this world of reboots and adaptations, some properties have better success than others being transplanted to a different setting, time, and even language. Whether for good or bad, some stories are inherently a product of the city or country in which they were made, and the stories lose some layers when they’re taken out of that context. Taking a look at the films coming from Thailand, what, if anything, makes the film uniquely Thai – whether it be thematically, technically, or in other ways.

Directed by Nawapol Thamrongrattanarit, Freelance is a story about a freelance graphic designer, Yoon (Sunny Suwanamethanon), who, through overwork, unhealthy eating and lack of sleep, develops a mysterious skin rash. When he goes to the public clinic, he falls for the caring and kind doctor who treats him, Imm (Davika Hoorne). It’s not quite as simple as that – there are themes of the importance of self-care as one grows older, the pressure to keep up with new talent, the lure of self-destruction, and the profound, inevitable loneliness of tech-based society.

So let’s get down to brass tacks: how Thai is this movie? Bangkok life is evident in certain beats of the story, particularly the humorous ones: the moto driver who accompanies Yoon’s business contact, Je (an exceptional Violette Wautier, whose deadpan delivery rivals Sara Gilbert from Roseanne); the fact that shrimp dumplings from 7-Eleven are Yoon’s favorite food; the traditional Thai-style funeral Yoon interrupts in the beginning of the movie (I was howling when he asked the monk if the temple had Wi-Fi). If we were to move this story to, say, New York, these idiosyncrasies would be lost; sure, Yoon’s favorite food could be cheeseburgers from McDonalds, but taxi-motorcycle drivers aren’t a thing that happens in the U.S., and asking a pastor about Wi-Fi in a church isn’t going to have the same kick – especially when in Bangkok, the monk casually hands over the password to his dwelling Wi-Fi.

The themes of this movie, however, are immediately recognizable and universal, for any 20- or 30-something struggling to balance personal life and career ambitions – and most especially for freelancers without basic health benefits coverage. In that respect, I could see this story set anywhere from Norway to Alaska to Jordan.

On a scale of 1 to 5, where 1 indicates that a person could barely tell the film was made in Thailand, and 5 indicates the movie is as inextricably Thai as Wat Pho and pad kra pao moo, I give Freelance 2 puang malai: easily adapted and translated, but you’re gonna lose some charm in the process.

Currently based in Bangkok, Lila hails from Los Angeles and has worked nearly every aspect of production on films, shorts, commercials, and TV. Follow her on Twitter @lilafromlala

Review: Freelance (aka Heart Attack)

• Written and directed by Nawapol Thamrongrattanarit
• Starring Sunny Suwanamethanon, Davika Hoorne, Violette Wautier
• Released in Thai cinemas on September 3, 2015; rated 13+
• Wise Kwai's rating: 5/5

Nawapol Thamrongrattanarit's offbeat indie stylishness remains intact in his big-studio directorial debut Freelance, a comedy the GTH studio has marketed as a bright romance involving a man afflicted with a rash and his female doctor. But it’s not really “Doctor, doctor, give me the news” – it’s more a sprawling, dark satire on the creative life becoming enslaved to deadline pressures.

Sure, the pulse quickens as the young female physician played by Davika Hoorne asks leading man Sunny Suwanamethanon to raise his shirt. But the sweet, tentative friendship that develops between them is only a small part of a long movie that in Thai is known by the longer title Freelance ... Ham Puay Ham Phak Ham Rak More (ฟรีแลนซ์.. ห้ามป่วย ห้ามพัก ห้ามรักหมอ).

It’s really about the ups and downs in the career of a freelance graphic designer.

Sunny is Yoon, a worker bee who spends his days and sleepless nights in his apartment, staring at a computer screen, retouching photos for magazine spreads and advertisements. So it’s cleverly ironic when the graphics guy who erases nip slips on fashion models comes down with a pesky skin rash. He at first goes to a private hospital and comes away with the requisite sack of overpriced pills that “may cause drowsiness”. These are of course less than helpful in Yoon’s all-work-no-sleep world, and are quickly chucked in the bin.

The rash persists and spreads and Yoon’s friends start to show concern, so he eventually ends up at one of those dreaded public hospitals. Here’s where Nawapol’s knack for observational humor really kicks in, as Yoon, turning up at the way-too-late hour of 6am, finds himself at the back of a vast intake queue that stretches through corridors and up a flight of stairs. It’s a guaranteed laugh for the audience because we’ve all been there and done that.

And there are a lot of scenes like that, based on the real-life experiences of writer-director Nawapol and his indie-filmmaking pals.

Another example has Yoon turning up at the funeral of a friend’s father. His deadline is looming, so he asks a monk for the temple’s Wi-Fi password and plugs in his laptop right by the casket. It sounds shocking, but some insensitive lunkhead somewhere has probably actually done that. And in the context of the movie, it’s hilarious.

After waiting an eternity in the hospital queue, Yoon finally meets his doctor. She’s Imm, a young resident who’s still studying her medical books. There’s a spark there, an unspoken recognition between the two that their lives are very similar. Although Imm already knows what Yoon is thinking, she can’t determine what’s causing his rash. She can only tell him things everyone knows – exercise, eat right and get plenty of rest. And, oh, don’t scratch.

Yoon makes small changes in his life, such as joining a gym, hitting the hay at a reasonable hour and laying off his beloved 7-Eleven shrimp puffs. But as soon as Yoon’s rash disappears, so do any feelings he might have had for the doctor. “It’s all good, doc,” he coldly tells her on a visit, opting to formally wai her instead of shake her outstretched hand. She’s visibly hurt. And soon Yoon is back to pulling all-nighters and subsisting on cocktails of Red Bull, soda and coffee.

The cast, as always with GTH films, is top-notch. Sunny, a reliable leading man in the studio’s comedy Dear Dakanda (in which he fell in love with a nurse) and last year’s I Fine Thank You Love You, fits the mold as Nawapol’s surrogate, no doubt with much help from the director, who loaned the actor some of his cool T-shirts to get into the role.

Davika takes a welcome turn in a contemporary setting, a more relatable shift from the period characters she’s played, like the ghost in Pee Mak and the tragic heroine of Plae Kao. In Freelance, she’s an achingly lonely figure, a medical student whose insecurity is of little help in the face of her inexperience. This is a view of hospitals and doctors more in line with the TV comedy Scrubs than how they are usually portrayed in Thailand, where the medical profession is held in high reverence.

There are many strong supporting characters, but the most valuable player is Violette Wautier as Yoon’s agent and level-headed best friend Je. She goes from enabling Yoon’s self-destructive work ethic to helping him get back on his feet.

Nawapol cast many other filmmakers in fun cameos in his indie feature Mary Is Happy, Mary Is Happy. Here, he has a couple of GTH talents. One is Pee Mak director Banjong Pisanthanakun, who steals the scene as a doctor substituting for Imm during one of Yoon’s visits. Another is Bangkok Traffic Love Story helmer Adisorn Trisirikasem, who appears in goofy photos as the soldier boyfriend of Je, and adds to his cult status as a quirky character actor, as also seen GTH’s Hormones TV series.

My only knock on Freelance is that, at two hours and 10 minutes, it probably runs too long. Nawapol knows this, but with a densely packed story that has so much to say, it’s hard to see where he and his editor Chonlasit Upanigkit could’ve made cuts. And Freelance is remarkable in that it sustains its level of interest and energy throughout. With most other commercial Thai films, the excitement tends to peter out after the first 30 minutes.

Freelance, also marketed internationally with Nawapol’s original and now-unnecessary title Heart Attack, represents a further blending of hip, indie-film street smarts with the corporate slickness for which GTH is known. While involvement with a big studio perhaps diminishes Nawapol’s hipster cred, GTH’s much-vaunted “feel-good” formula is subverted, and Thai film culture is much richer for that.

(Cross-published in The Nation)

Related posts:

• In Thai cinemas: Freelance, So Very Very

In Thai cinemas: There's Something About Tott

There's only one new Thai movie in cinemas this week, a romantic comedy called Love Hiao Fiao Tott (เลิฟเฮี้ยวเฟี้ยวต๊อด, a.k.a. There’s Something About Tott).

It's about a hapless hipster who the ladies think for some reason is super handsome. They fall all over themselves trying to be close, making it difficult for him to carry on in life and hold down a job. Played by Khunathip Pinpradab, he needs to raise money to get his grandmother out of the nursing home.

The director is the prolific Poj Anon, who this time around is being credited with his real name, Anon Mingkhwanta, perhaps in a move to rebrand and distance himself from his many critically assailed movies of the past.

Aside from young Nick Khunathip, who appeared in Poj's recent films, such as the Mor 6/5 (Make Me Shudder!) schoolboy horror comedies, his Iron Ladies remake and one of the Die a Violent Death horror antholgies, There's Something About Tott features veteran stage and screen actress Duangta Tungkamanee as Tott's mother and celebrity make-up artist, media personality and actress Ornapha Krisadee.

Review: Chalui Tae Khob Fah (Lost in Seoul)

• Directed by Adirek Watleela and Suchart Makhawimarn
• Starring Mek Mekwattana, Nachat Juntapun, Zuvapit Traipornworakit, Nichkhun Horvejkul
• Released in Thai cinemas on June 4, 2015; rated 13+
• Wise Kwai's rating: 3/5

Rags-to-riches stories of struggling musicians looking for their big break are a dime a dozen, so journeyman producer Adirek "Uncle" Watleela got a real bargain with Chalui Tae Khob Fah (ฉลุย แตะขอบฟ้า, a.k.a. Lost in Seoul), which is a remake of a movie he first did in 1988.

The original, about two country lads looking to take Bangkok by storm, is repurposed for the K-pop era, and sends the bumbling heroes from Bangkok to Seoul, where they dream of bringing Thai rock to the uptight corporate ranks of South Korea's entertainment machine. Their big inspiration is a fellow Thai, Nichkhun Horvejkul, who is famous as the Thai guy in the boyband 2PM.

The story starts off in a dream sequence with Nichkhun as a pizza-delivery guy. Uncle and co-director Suchart Makhawimarn seem to be taking their cues from Christopher Nolan as they aim to keep things as off-kilter as possible, with a rapid succession of dreams, flashbacks and sight gags to propel the action as they introduce the two lead characters – long-haired guitarist Pong (Mek "Jessie" Mekwattana) and his singer pal Tong (Nachat "Nicky" Juntapun).

Amid this rapidly moving shell-game of a comedy, one thing becomes quickly apparent – Pong and Tong are no-talent hacks. But they're nice enough fellows, and their enthusiasm makes up somewhat for their lack of finessed dance moves. But behind their earthworm-like shimmying, it's all empty – they are lipsynching to a recording, and their instruments, which are just hollow shells, are unplugged.

But it doesn't matter. Uncle, well-versed in the art of showbiz hocus-pocus, manages to keep up a breakneck level of energy. The Thai Blues Brothers continue to practice their music on their rooftop and dream of their big break, with support from their endlessly cheerful comic neighbor (Phongthep Anurat), who becomes their manager. The suspense comes from the wonder of how long can the energy be sustained, and, will these sad clowns somehow have what it takes?

Uncle, as always, can't resist inserting references to his other movies. So the boys, in their apartment decorated by a Black Sabbath vinyl clock (points added), a Good Charlotte poster (points deducted) and toilet stool for a desk chair (points added), pop a DVD into a portable player. It's Tears of the Black Tiger, the melodramatic western by Wisit Sasanatieng that Uncle co-produced. It's a scene where two male characters pray together and seal a blood bond.

And, I'm pretty sure that's the two actors from the original Chalui Tae Kob Fah (literally Touch the Sky) popping up in another scene to give the younger lads encouragement. Later on, Pong and Tong find a DVD for Yuthlert Sippapak's Chiang Khan Love Story, which Uncle produced only last year. And watch for Uncle in a cameo as a cop.

Like the movie's characters, Chalui Tae Khob Fah gets by on sheer amiability. The boys are guys you wouldn't mind hanging out with for a night, and the movie is like that too. It spends roughly half its time goofing around in Bangkok before jetting off to Seoul, and I hardly noticed an hour had gone by.

Once in Seoul, where the production values are eyepopping, the boys rapidly go through the usual succession of adventures – getting mixed up with mobsters, street hoods and bent cops. Only the Illinois Nazis are missing. They lose their money and passports and then fumble their way into another situation that leads to them making friends with colorful locals.

There's the usual succession of nods to Korean culture, which have become stock-in-trade for Thai-South Korean productions. The gold standard of these remains GTH's blockbuster romance Guan Muen Ho (Hello Stranger). Others have included Poj Arnon's Kao Rak Thee Korea (Sorry Saranghaeyo), Wisit and Michael Shaowanasai's short Iron Pussy: A Kimchi Affair for the Busan-backed Camellia and Prachya Pinkaew's Bangkok-set South Korean martial-arts comedy The Kick.

Thanks to Oldboy, we must have a wriggling octopus, and I'd be disappointed if there weren't any octopuses. But there's also Korean theater and music, thanks to a young woman named Meehwa, her mother and their friends. Of course, she turns out to be half-Thai, and can serve as the boys' translator, helping them get jobs and fast-talk their way out of sticky situations. If it seems like she's everywhere, it's because she is. It's singer-actress "Baitoei" Zuvapit Traipornworakit in a dual role as Meewha and as Bangkok neighborhood doll Tukdta. So there's enough of Baitoei to go around for both of the guys.

One convenient situation after another befalls Pong and Tong as they try to land an audition with an executive at a Korean record label who they first met on a drunken night out in Bangkok. Boyband member "Buck" Nichkhun turns up again, and agrees to help the guys, because they are fellow Thais. Because that's overseas Thai code. Or something.

Soon, we're all singing along to a street-performer backed rendition of the anthem "Arirang", complete with classical Korean instruments, a bicycle drum set and crunchy Thai rock-guitar power chords.

Chalui Tae Khob Fah is the third release for Transformation Films, the new company formed by the former Film Bangkok producer pair of Uncle and Sa-nga Chatchairungruang. Other features so far have been last year's award-winning Chiang Khan Love Story by Yuthlert and this past February's romantic comedy Single Lady Phror Khoei Me Fan, directed by Thanakorn Pongsuwan (Fireball).

Like the others, Chalui Tae Khob Fah has performed very modestly at the local box office, with earnings of 1.5 million baht in its first week, trailing far, far behind the Hollywood behemoths Spy, San Andreas, Tomorrowland and Mad Max: Fury Road. At last count, Chalui had only doubled its first week's earnings, but it remains in theaters thanks to Transformation's partnership with Major Cineplex, Thailand's biggest multiplex operator. If it were anyone else's film, it would have been booted out after a few days.

Despite iffy box-office prospects – hardly anyone in Thailand is watching Thai films these days unless they come from GTH – we'll likely be seeing more of this type of thing. Also backing Chalui Tae Khob Fah was the Korean entertainment mega-firm CJ E&M Film Division, which is separately joining up with Major Cineplex in a three-year 10-film deal for more Thai-South Korean co-productions, likely from Transformation, or the half-dozen or so other Major Cineplex-backed production companies.

See also:

• CJ enters joint venture with Major Cineplex [Film Business Asia]

Bangkok Critics award Tukkae Rak Pang Mak

Producer Adirek "Uncle" Watleela takes the microphone to accept the best film award for Tukkae Rak Pang Mak. He also took the stage to accept awards for his friend Yuthlert Sippapak. Nation photo by Tatchadon Panyaphanitkul.

The nostalgic romantic comedy Tukkae Rak Pang Mak (Chiang Khan Story) took the top prizes at the 23rd Bangkok Critics Assembly Awards (ชมรมวิจารณ์บันเทิง) on Wednesday night, winning trophies for Best Film, director, screenplay and acting.

While writer-director Yuthlert Sippapak wasn't on hand to accept his awards, the team of producers from the new shingle Transformation Films was there, among them Yuthlert's long-time collaborator, producer Adirek "Uncle" Watleela.

Released last September, Tukkae Rak Pang Mak chronicled the 20 or so years in the rocky romance of childhood friends in Chiang Khan, the rustic town on the Mekong River in Northeast Thailand's Loei province, where Yuthlert calls home. It was the first release from Transformation, which is a partnership between the producers behind the former Film Bangkok marque and Major Cineplex, Thailand's biggest multiplex operator. It performed only modestly at the box office, so the awards haul was welcomed by the Transformation team.

The actor who played Tukkae, Jirayu La-ongmanee, a former child star, repeated his success from the Thai film industry's "Oscars", the Subhanahongsa Awards. He won the prize for best actor for his portrayal of a young filmmaker who is named after a house lizard. He faces an awkward situation when his first screenplay is to be made into a movie, and producers want his former childhood crush to be the star. But she and Tukkae had a big misunderstanding.

Jirayu's co-star Kongkiat Komsiri was named best supporting actor for his turn as Tukkae's level-headed best friend. Though Kongkiat has appeared on screen before, he's better known as a director of gritty movies like Slice and Muay Thai Chaiya. Hopefully his next one, the historical action drama Khun Pan (ขุน พันธ์ ), will actually be released this year.

Another big winner was Nawapol Thamrongrattanarit's The Master, a documentary about the enigmatic Bangkok movie pirate Mr. Van, whose bootleg videos provided a generation of Thai filmmakers and critics with an education in world cinema in the days before bitorrent downloads. A colorful array of prominent directors and movie critics appear in the film, sharing their memories of Van VDO in talking-head interviews against a simple backdrop. It was named best documentary and was also awarded for film editing.

Another documentary, Nontawat Numbenchapol's By the River, about a Karen village left devastated by lead mining, won for its original score by Karen musicians.

And the GTH studio's hit romantic drama The Teacher's Diary (คิดถึงวิทยา, Kid Tueng Wittaya) took two prizes, for cinematography and art direction.

With nods in nearly every category, the leading nominee was Lee Chatametikool's 1997-set drama Concrete Clouds (ภวังค์รัก, Phawang Rak), which took the top prizes at the Subhanahongsa Awards. At the Bangkok Critics Assembly Awards, it ended up with just one trophy, for best supporting actress for Apinya Sakuljaroensuk.

Lee was also among the nominees for the Critics Young Filmmaker Awards, which were introduced last year. Perhaps the Bangkok Critics were confused, since Concrete Clouds was Lee's first feature as a director, and while he's still a relatively young man, he's been overseeing award-winning editing and post-production for indie and commercial features in Bangkok for more than a decade.

Other Young Filmmaker nominees included Vorakorn Ruetaivanichkul, director of Mother, Chonlasit Upanigkit, director of W., and Krisada Tipchaimeta who made Somboon, all first features from rookie filmmakers. The prize went to Uten Sririvi and Jinnaphat Ladarat, who made the indie country comedy Phoobao Thai Baan E-San Indy (ผู้บ่าวไทบ้าน อีสานอินดี้, or simply PBTB), which caused something of a stir when it was first turned down by Bangkok multiplex operators but became a box-office hit in Thailand's rural Northeast.

There's more on the ceremony in a story in The Nation today.

• Best Film: Tukkae Rak Pang Mak (Chiang Khan Story).
• Director: Yuthlert Sippapak, Chiang Khan Story
• Screenplay: Yuthlert Sippapak, Chiang Khan Love Story
• Actor: Jirayu La-ongmanee, Chiang Khan Story
• Actress: Sucha Manaying, The Couple (รัก ลวง หลอน, Rak Luang Lon)
• Supporting actor: Kongkiat Komesiri,  Chiang Khan Story
• Supporting actress: Apinya Sakuljaroensuk, Concrete Clouds
• Cinematography: Narupon Chokkanapitak, The Teacher’s Diary
• Film editing: Nawapol Thamrongrattanarit, The Master
• Original song: “Jaikhwam Samkhan” by the Musketeer, from Rak Mod Kaew (รักหมดแก้ว, a.k.a. Love on the Rock)
• Original score: By the River
• Art direction: Akradej Kaewkote, The Teacher’s Diary
• Best documentary: The Master
• Young Filmmaker Award: Uten Sririvi, Jinnaphat Ladarat, Phoobao Thai Baan: E-San Indy
• Lifetime Achievement Award: Somsak Techaratanaprasert, producer, and Amara Asavanond, actress
• Box Office Award: I Fine ... Thank You ... Love You

I Fine ... Thank You ... Love You takes two prizes at Osaka

Last year's No. 1 movie at the Thai box office, the GTH studio's romantic comedy I Fine ... Thank You ... Love You (ไอฟาย..แต๊งกิ้ว..เลิฟยู้) took two prizes at the 10th Osaka Asian Film Festival.

Director Mez Tharatorn was named most-promising talent while I Fine's lead actress Preechaya "Ice" Pongthananikorn, won the Yakushi Pearl Award for her performance as a well-to-do celebrity English-language tutor who is reluctantly roped into teaching a boorish blue-collar factory worker to speak English so he can get back with his Japanese ex-girlfriend.

GTH stock-company leading man Sunny Suwanmethanon works his eyebrows into overdrive as the sneering greaser-styled biker guy in a factory jumpsuit, who needs schooling so he can join his Japanese girlfriend in the States. She's played by another GTH regular, spunky Japanese former AV idol Sora Aoi.

For Mez, the Osaka honor follows his previous box-office successes with the critically acclaimed Little Comedian and the 2012 box-office smash ATM Er Rak Err.

Formulated for GTH's proven demographic of well-heeled socially networked urban Thais, the fractured-English film came close to breaking Ong-Bak's record for first-day earnings, with 29 million baht. It then proceeded past the Thai industry's benchmark 100-million-baht threshold in its first three days, with the reported opening weekend earnings boosted by a Wednesday opening that coincided with the still-observed December 10 government holiday, Constitution Day. As the year ended, I Fine had hit the 200-million-baht mark and was still going. Like other GTH pictures, it's also proving popular in other Asian territories.

I Fine was also among nominees for the recent Subhanahongsa Awards, with 11 nods, including best film, director, screenplay and acting prizes.

In Osaka, other awards went to Taiwanese director Yee Chee-yen's youth drama Meeting Dr. Sun, which took the Grand Prize and the Audience Award. Film Business Asia has the full rundown.

Review: Ror Dor Khao Chon Phee Thee Khao Chon Kai

• Directed by Tanwarin Sukkhapisit
• Starring Somchai Kemklad
• Released in Thai cinemas on January 22, 2015; rated 15+
• Wise Kwai's rating: 2/5

The commercialization of former indie rebel Tanwarin Sukkapisit continues apace with the throw-away horror-comedy Ror Dor Khao Chon Phee Thee Khao Chon Kai (รด.เขาชนผีที่เขาชนไก่).

Produced by that infamous purveyor of cross-dressing schlock, Poj Arnon, and released by Phranakorn Film, audiences can be excused for believing they are seeing yet another movie directed by the prolific Poj. It looks very similar to Poj's recent Mor 6/5 horror comedies, which involve a dozen or so schoolboys in various states of shrieking and shirtlessness.

But no, it's directed by Tanwarin, who co-wrote the script. The story, best as I can make out, has schoolboys in Kanchanaburi's Khao Chon Kai military boot-camp, taking part in Thailand's version of the Junior Reserve Officer Training Corps (JROTC). It's a scheme that gets young men out of having to participate in the drawing for the military draft, but here they have to contend with something far more frightening (to them anyway) – a pair of ghosts.

One of the pale-skinned spirits is portrayed with his usual frightening intensity by veteran leading man Somchai Kemklad. I'm not sure he needed much makeup. He's a terrifying drill instructor who has become even more menacing ever since his run-in a year before with a landmine. The other ghost is a kid, a cadet, who was apparently killed by the dead drill instructor. He always turns up and greets the frightened boys with a quick twitch of his eyebrow.

As with these horror comedies, most of the time is eaten up by the usual headache-inducing running around and screaming, even though the ghosts aren't very scary. The scares, such as they are, are interspersed with a bath-time dance sequence, with the boys doing a K-pop number while wearing just their underwear briefs.

With nearly a dozen schoolboy characters, it's near impossible to pick one as outstanding. All look the same in (and out) of uniform, with the same buzzcut hairstyle. And they act in the same stupid manner with little to distinguish them apart. There's a mean guy, and another guy has a dumb smile. Yet another guy always freezes in place when he encounters a ghost, which actually isn't a bad tactic. There's an interesting trio of comic-relief ladyboy characters, all with the requisite amount of sass, but with a cast already filled with clowns, they aren't really needed and are quickly forgotten.

There are probably serious issues this overwhelmingly homoerotic film could have dealt with, such as how gay guys and transgenders cope with the boot-camp setting. But with all the nonsensical running around and screaming, it's hard to take anything seriously.

Behind-the-scenes photos from the set indicate that Tanwarin likely had a blast playing general to her troupe of young actors in army uniforms. I think they had more fun making the movie than anyone did watching it.

For Tanwarin, Ror Dor represents yet another move deeper into commercial territory after years of making edgy short films. Well respected within the industry, the transgender filmmaker took hard knocks when her highly personal and sexually explicit indie drama Insects in the Backyard was banned from screening in Thailand. She then set out on a purely commercial direction, helming the Issan-dialect country comedy Hak Na Sarakham (produced by Prachya Pinkaew at Sahamongkol) and then turning back to transgender issues and addressing them in a mainstream way with the award-winning drama It Gets Better. Last year, she did two decent features, the cute horror comedy Threesome and the Japanese-Thai romance Fin Sugoi. Tanwarin hooked up with Poj on the producer-director's Die a Violent Death omnibus horrors, directing the better segments, acting in front of the lens and helping with various other aspects of the productions.

Here's hoping Tanwarin is banking the cash earned from these jobs, with an eye toward making another award-winner. That would distinguish her from Poj, who just seems to keep making bad movies and then using the cash from those to make more bad movies.

See also:

• Official trailer from Phranakornfilm
• Duck when a movie's bad [Soopsip, The Nation]

EXpatZ sets Thai premiere

ExpatZ, a short film made in Thailand that has been screening and winning awards at fests worldwide, will make its Bangkok premiere next week at the Foreign Correspondents Club of Thailand.

Directed by Jimmie Wing, ExpatZ is a psychedelic horror-comedy mash-up set in the totally fictional country of Wighland, which bears no resemblance at all to Thailand. Nope. Not one bit. Anyway, in this strange land, a foreign TV journalist encounters all sorts of colorful characters as he tracks down a rogue retired American military officer.

Here's more details:

A foreign television reporter specializes in interviewing bizarre foreigners living in Wighland. The reporter and his local partner, Professor Roasted Squid, take off to find an especially peculiar retired American military officer. Ordinarily, the boss of a local hamburger joint, the retired officer hides a secret culinary technology. When a few of the reporter’s jealous "friends" show up on the scene, they get caught up in a long and unexpectedly strange trip. The hilarious antics and cross-cultural relationships of these crazy white people perfectly set the scene for this wild adventure.

In awarding Jimmie Wing's film the grand prize for best short film, the Urban Nomad Film Festival (Taiwan’s largest independent film confab) said, "Adopting a humorous and visually alluring style, EXpatZ describes the strange and twisted stories of Westerners in Asia and the adventures of one Asian people’s turnabout in fortunes. The film is a satire on the ridiculousness of the superiority of white people and lampoons standards of racial stereotyping. Through extreme subversion and sabotage, EXpatZ presents a multi-faceted view of the relative relationship between the West and Asia within the ecology of Southeast Asian colonialism.”

The screening is set for Wednesday, November 19, at the Foreign Correspondents Club of Thailand. The event starts at 6pm with hamburgers, followed by the film at 7pm. Wing will talk and answer questions later, along with co-leads Soontorn Meesri and Lex Luther. Kamonrat Ladseeta, who plays Madame Quoits, the wife of Commander Quoits (Darren Potter), will also field questions.

Check out the trailer, embedded below.

Review: Tukkae Rak Pang Mak (Chiang Khan Story)

• Directed by Yuthlert Sippapak
• Starring Jirayu La-ongmanee, Chonthida Asavahame
• Released in Thai cinemas on August 28, 2014; rated 15+
• Wise Kwai's rating: 3/5

Yuthlert Sippapak pays homage to his roots with the partly autobiographical romantic comedy Tukkae Rak Pang Mak (ตุ๊กแกรักแป้งมาก, a.k.a. Chiang Khan Story.

Spanning 20 years from the 1970s to the '90s in the Mekong River town of Chiang Khan in Yuthlert's home province of Loei, it's the story of childhood friends, the poor little orphan boy with the odd name of Tukkae (after the large chirping house lizard that's believed be a bad omen) and the wealthy girl Pang. They later grow apart, but are forced back together by circumstances that only happen in romantic comedies.

The first half of the movie, featuring a cast of child actors, is energetic, sweet and nostalgic, weaving in memories of 4-baht wooden cap guns with the rubber-band action, the then-newfangled foreign treat of jellybeans and GAF Viewmasters.

Tukkae and Pang take to hanging around the town's wooden shophouse cinema. It's during a magical time when such Thai cinema classics as Sombat Metanee's gritty actioner Chumpae is playing alongside Payut Ngaokrachang's animated triumph The Adventures of Sudsakorn and Sompote Sands' insane Hanuman vs. 7 Ultraman.

The kids are mentored by the theater's poster painter, played by Yuthlert's longtime collaborator "Uncle" Adirek Watleela. His character Pong Poster is a heartfelt tribute to still-living 1970s' director Piak Poster, who started out as a poster artist, as well as Uncle's late Buppa Rahtree co-star, character actor and production designer Bunthin Thuaykaew.

Tukkae, always on the defensive because of his funny nickname and his status as a poor orphan kid, seeks to play with the gang of chubby boys who always bully him. In lively action scenes, they blast away with their cap guns while wearing Red Eagle masks, like Mitr Chaibancha. And Tukkae accepts a dare that drives Pang out of his life, seemingly forever.

Flash forward a few years to Bangkok, Tukkae is a comic-book artist with aspirations of getting in the movie business. He's partnered up with a level-headed and experienced film hand, amiably played by Slice director Kongkiat Khomsiri, one of several film industry hands in the cast. In another scene, Thanit Jitnukul (Bang Rajan) turns up as a producer. He can't believe Tukkae doesn't know what a "treatment" is.

The guys are tasked with making a Mae Nak "liverscape" movie by a hilariously marble-mouthed B-movie producer who sees nothing wrong with moving the famous ghost story from Phra Khanong to Chiang Khan. Tukkae has other ideas, and he writes an "untitled" screenplay that is basically his life story, with a focus on his relationship with Pang.

The implausibilities stack up as Tukkae encounters Pang by chance in a Bangkok disco, and she doesn't remember him at all. In fact, nobody from Tukkae's old school remembers what anybody looks like. But this is, refreshingly, before Facebook and selfies, so I suppose the disbelief can be suspended somewhat. Mistaken identities and misunderstandings add to Tukkae's woes as Pang wakes up in Tukkae's bedroom and doesn't recognize Tukkae or any of his stuff (not even the Viewmaster she gave him).

But the two are thrown together anyway when Pang, now a famous actress, is cast for the role in Tukkae's movie. Awkwardness ensues on the set as Pang is confronted with the guy she only recognizes from that bad night out. She doesn't realize it's her old childhood friend, nor does she seem aware that he actually wrote the screenplay for the movie she's in.

The energy and sweetness of the movie's first half gives way to a wallowing slackness that's struggling to find an ending. It's not helped by the rather wooden performances by Kao Jirayu and Pleng Chontida. Kao, a former child actor with many credits, has better chemistry in later scenes with his character's dementia-addled grandmother who raised him. Pleng, the celebrity offspring of singer Nantida Kaewbuasai and scandal-plagued politician Chonsawat Asavahame, is making her screen debut, but seems to let a curly hairstyle and aviator sunglasses do all the work for her.

The supporting cast, especially the Tukky-type actress who plays Pang's best friend and manager, help to liven things up. She is friends with soldiers at the local army base, and they turn up on command to dish out beatings to anyone getting on her wrong side. Boriboon Chanruang portrays a director who spent so long in New York he's forgotten to speak Thai. He becomes Tukkae's chief rival in romancing Pang.

Yuthlert seems to have suppressed his infamous genre-jumping tendencies in an effort to make what he's called his first romantic comedy, though melodrama, horror and slapstick all creep their way in, just not as much or as often as his past films.

Tukkae Rak Pang Mak also marks a comeback of sorts for Yuthlert, who has done more than a dozen films over around half as many years up until a year or so ago. However, his last effort, the potentially controversial Deep South drama Fatherland (ปิตุภูมิ พรมแดนแห่งรัก, Pitupoom) was yanked from release by the film's producer. So Yuthlert retreated to Loei to regroup.

His new film is the first release from a new studio, Transformation Films, which is a joint venture of M Pictures, Bangkok Film Studio (formerly Film Bangkok), True I-Content and Matching Studio.

Box-office performance for Tukkae has been middling, with 12.7 million baht in earnings at last count, but hopefully the company will soldier on and perhaps give one of Thai cinema's most distinctive voices yet another chance to tell his stories.

See also:

• True Group in filmmaking JV to cash in on local, foreign demand [The Nation]
• Transformation Films YouTube channel

Review: Mor 6/5 Pak Ma Tha Mae Nak

• Directed by Poj Arnon
• Starring Wanida Termthanporn, Pongpit Preechaborisutkun
• Released in Thai cinemas on April 10, 2014; rated G
• Wise Kwai's rating: 2/5

Since the legend of Mae Nak Phra Khanong originated more than a century ago, storytellers, playwrights and filmmakers have all sought to put their own spin on the tale of the ghost wife Nak, who died in childbirth while her husband was away at war. But her love was so strong, her spirit remained, and when Mak returned, his love was so strong, he was blind to the fact that his wife was no longer alive.

Now comes Thailand's reigning cinematic snakeoil salesman, Poj Arnon. A shameless opportunist who's never one to shy away from making a film that's ripped from today's headlines, his latest zeitgeist-capturing effort is Mor 6/5 Pak Ma Tha Mae Nak (มอ 6/5 ปากหมาท้าแม่นาค, a.k.a. Mathayom pak ma tha Mae Nak). It blends last year's blockbuster Thai movie Pee Mak – the record-shattering box-office hit – with his own 2013 horror-comedy, Mor 6/5 Pak Ma Tha Pee (Make Me Shudder!), in which bratty schoolboys ran and screamed as they were chased by ghost teachers.

While GTH's Pee Mak added four of Mak's bumbling war buddies to the Mae Nak Phra Khanong story, Poj ups the ante by adding 10 foul-mouthed shrieking schoolboys in short pants.

Taking a cue from another of last year's hit movies, the indie teen drama Tang Wong, the Mathayom 6/5 fellows pray to the Mae Nak shrine for good luck on their school exams. But, being complete idiots, they insult the shrine and find themselves pulled back in time to Mae Nak's day.

They then hamfistedly attempt to assist in Mae Nak's giving birth, but of course botch things up.

Later, Nak and her baby Dang appear to be just fine, and apparently alive. She tasks the boys with going to the battlefield to track down Mak and tell him the good news.

Of course, the lads all have to don period clothing, so off come the shirts, out come outlandish "historic" hairstyles and, for good measure, their teeth are blackened in keeping with the fashion of the era.

A short action scene later, the boys have returned with Mak (Pongpit Preechaborisutkun), but something's off. It appears Nak is dead after all. Torch- and pitchfork-wielding villagers band together against the ghost while the boys attempt to gently clue Mak in while also not upsetting Nak.

The story then follows the usual lines of the Mae Nak story as well as the usual Thai horror-comedy rhythms of nonsensical, headache-inducing running around and screaming.

Poj sets up plenty of opportunities for the boys to get close together, grabbing onto each other out of fear. Several scenes are devoted to the shirtless, loincloth clad young men sleeping, arranged with one boy's head making a pillow out of another lad's groin, much to the audience's delight.

Singer-actress Wanida "Gybzy Girly Berry" Termthanaporn joins the pantheon of Thai actresses to take on the role of Nak. Unfortunately, she isn't given much to do, other than look fierce, and I'm not sure she pulls it off. It seems she is upstaged by hair, makeup, costume and cheesy special effects, including a rubbery-looking arm stretch (hey, about a Stretch Armstrong-style Mae Nak action figure?)

As with the first Mor 6/5, the movie was filmed in 3D – the second to come from studio Phranakorn. But I didn't see it in 3D – Thai 3D releases are quickly supplanted in local cinemas by Hollywood 3D action movies and animation, so if you don't see them in 3D in the first week or so, you'll likely miss out. But I don't feel I missed a thing. If anything, the 3D would have just given me a bigger headache.

Mor 6/5 Pak Ma Tha Mae Nak has persisted in hanging around in cinemas after nearly a month, earning around 30 million baht, according to the latest published account. It's not near the record-setting levels of Pee Mak, but it's probably enough that Poj and Phranakorn will do another sequel, just as long as the boys look good in short pants and school uniforms.

See also:

• Official trailer

Review: The Teacher's Diary (Kid Tueng Wittaya)

• Directed by Nithiwat Tharatorn
• Starring Chermarn Boonyasak, Sukrit Wisetkaew
• Released in Thai cinemas on March 20, 2014; rated G
• Wise Kwai's rating: 4/5

Toeing a fine line between sweetness and mawkishness, the sentimental GTH romance The Teacher's Diary (คิดถึงวิทยา, Kid Tueng Wittaya) mostly sticks to that line thanks to a fairly tight script, top-notch technical work, a memorable location and, of course, appealing performances by two fine lead actors.

Directed by one of GTH's "Fan Chan six", Nithiwat Tharatorn (Season's Change, Dear Galileo), the comedy-drama follows the stories of two lonely teachers, a woman and a man, who are posted to the same rural school a year apart. The setting is on a houseboat in the middle of a lake up in the mountains of Chiang Mai. Stuck out the boonies, with no electricity, phone service or Internet, one of the teachers turns to keeping an illustrated diary, pouring her thoughts and frustrations into it. When she transfers to another school, she leaves the diary behind. The well-worn notebook is then found by the young man who takes up the rural post. He reads the diary, falls in love with the writer and writes some of his own things in it. After the guy leaves, the woman resumes her former position and finds what he has written, and, having heard a few things about him, she also starts to fall in love, even though the two have never met.

Country schoolteacher dramas are a time-honored subgenre of Thai cinema. They used to be more frequent in the 1970s and '80s, when filmmakers tackled social problems. The setting is the same, thanks to that stunning lake with no cellphone service, so The Teacher's Diary is able to recall the feel of the classic old films while blending in bits of contemporary society. But the issues are more personal, detailing the growth of two young characters who rise to a challenge and accomplish more than they ever thought they would.

The Teacher's Diary also captures the spirit of another GTH film, The Tin Mine (มหา'ลัย เหมืองแร่, Maha'lai Muang Rae), about a college dropout learning life lessons at a Phuket mining outpost in the 1950s. The ramshackle little floating school in Teacher's Diary reminded me of the massive dredge GTH built as the centerpiece for The Tin Mine. Jira Maligool, director of the 2005 film, is a producer of Teacher's Dairy and he helped shape the project. Just like the dredge and jungle setting of The Tin Mine, the ragged diary and the floating schoolhouse of Teacher's Diary become strong icons to build a story upon.

"Ploy" Chermarn Boonyasak is Ann, and totally convincing as a stubborn young woman who butts heads with the school district's principal after she gets a small tattoo of three little stars on her wrist. After she refuses to have the tat removed, Ann is assigned to the tiny elementary school on the houseboat. There, her animated style of teaching and informal hipster wardrobe endear her to the half dozen or so impossibly cute students, all children of fishermen.

Ann's story unfolds in parallel to that of Song – No. 2 – a washed-up former Thai national-team wrestler who compensates for his lunkheadedness with sheer enthusiasm. But exuberance isn't enough, so he is assigned to the district's lowest post – the houseboat school. He arrives to find the place empty, Ann having moved on and no schoolchildren around.

Sukrit “Bie" Wisetkaew makes his much-touted big-screen debut as the lovable goofball Song. A runner-up on the Exact/GMM Grammy TV talent show "The Star" eight years ago, he's dropped the show's title from his nickname, but is probably the best-known of its discoveries, having performed on TV and stage and become much-sought-after for product endorsements and appearances. In addition to movies, the singer-actor is even being groomed for a role on Broadway.

Of the two teachers, Ann adapts the easiest to life at the lake school. When there's a crisis, she jumps right in to save the day, even though she can barely swim. (Indeed, Ploy had to take swimming lessons and overcome her fear of water for the role.) Song has a rougher time. On his first outing in the school's boat, he breaks his arm when he engages the longtail motor. Ann is the better teacher – smarter and more skilled. Song has to work out the algebra problems in private before presenting them to the kids. But Song's dedication is heartwarming. He faces his own crisis, and rebuilds everything, even the diary itself. He tracks down a former student and persuades the boy to return to his studies. Without Song, the school would likely not be afloat.

Outside of school, Ann and Song are in unhappy relationships. Song's girlfriend takes up with another guy, and Ann's boyfriend is a controlling jerk. It's the stringing along of whether Song and Ann will ever meet that keeps the movie going but also starts to wear thin as the 90-minute mark passes. It seems natural that Ann and Song would connect through the diary and fall for each other, but various circumstances, missed connections and a missing tattoo keep that pairing something that happens only in dreams.

Of course this is a GTH movie, which are all so very happy and uplifting, even if they are depressing psychological horrors. So, well, you know ...

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• GTH deals Teacher's Diary, Laddaland in Hong Kong