Land of Grief (แผ่นดินวิปโยค, 1978)

In July 2011 a disaster would strike Thailand. Triggered by the tropical storm Nock-ten, flooding destroyed properties to a value of 45 billion dollars. 65 provinces was affected by the water and over 500 people died. It's the fourth most costly disaster ever. It ended in the middle of January 2012, but when me and G visited the country in March this year we could still see damage and it was something that caused a national trauma that won't be forgotten for a long time. When disasters happen in Thai movie it's often water involved. Sompote "Sands" Saengduenchai's 1978 disaster-drama Land of Grief is probably his most serious movie, even if I had a hard time following the story without subtitles. I don't think it's worth even trying to, but what we have here is Sorapong Chatree playing a the hero. It's set around a small town plagued by a gang of bandits, killing and robbing people. It all ends in a disaster, a terrible disaster, cleaning the land like an act of god. In the centre of it all is an ancient pagoda and the last we see in the movie is how it's rebuilt (it's a real pagoda) and reconstructed after what once happened. 

It takes 75 minutes for something to happen in this movie. Ah, I'm sure a lot of things happen in the first hour also - but the lack of subs made it virtually impossible to understand what was going on. It's drama, some comedy, some romance and of course the sadistic gangsters doing their evil deeds. It all ends when they brutally kill a family, executing them one by one, and maybe that's what sets of the disaster. A fury from mother earth herself.

First strikes winds, a nasty storm. Then an earthquake and finally tidal waves... and yeah, then some more store another earthquake! This is old-school disasters. Miniature houses and landscapes ripped apart by thundering earthquakes, families flushed away in slow-motion from the tidal wave, lightning attacking the bad guys and one character dies a bloody and graphic death when he's impaled by a tree! Sompote learned from his mentors at Toho, from Kurusawa and Honda. To make the audience suffer he must make the characters suffer - and with delivering a lot of character-development in the first hour it feels a lot more engaging when they die one after another in the last half. The effects is fairly well done also. Like always, it's easy to see that their are miniatures - but works fine considering the probably very low budget.

The mood also changes during the last hour. It's darker and nastier, far from the family friendly thrills in the beginning. Sorapong Chatree, an excellent actor, does his traditional hero - a free spirit who walks from village to village. Hardly anything new from him, but he's good - as usual. Like always, the only bad things in this movie is a couple of scenes with animal-killings. Well, I don't think we actually see them kill the animals (snakes and a lizard), but it's enough for me seeing them getting ripped in pieces by medicine men and chefs.

I was prepared to just skip this movie, but the last half made it so much more interesting. It also reminds me of what we saw in Thailand. One day me, G and Tong visited Sompote in his office and home outside Ayutthaya. After a couple of hours talking and walking around we left, but we asked if we could stop by the studio close to the entrance. "Of course", which was good - I wanted to take a photo of the giant crocodile we saw on our way inside.

The studio was more or less wiped out by the floods. Thousands of posters laid out on the floor to dry. Many of them melted together from the water. But there, leaned against a wall, the pagoda stood. The original miniature used in the movie. This time it made it.

It defeated the disaster...

Tah Tien (ท่าเตียน, 1971)

Fresh after many years in Japan under the supervision of both Kurusawa and Ishiro Honda, Thai visionary and all around monster-fan Sompote Saengduenchai (aka Sompote Sands) came home to Thailand with a whole new concept: Kaiju, something that's never been done in Thailand before - and Sompote had to be first. I manage to collect a budget of 120 000 dollars (which was quite much in bath during this time, as you can imagine), hired hot star Sombat Metanee and set out to do the ultimate first Thai monster movie. The result became Tah Tien.

It's a bit hard to follow the storyline, but it seems to be a mix of Thai mythology and just the wacky imagination of Sompote. A giant snakes swims ashore, vomits an egg and swims away. A frog crawls out from it's cave, eats the egg and vomits it again! The egg explodes and a small woman appears. She then transfers her soul (or something like that) to the frog who not long after this befriends an old and they smoke huge cigarettes together. Just look at this:

Anyway... the snake (or maybe we should call it a serpent?) transforms into a man who starts searching after his egg...woman...frog. At the same time Sombat Metanee is a hunky jungle-adventurer with his trademark curly hair and muscular, manly arms (sorry, got carried away there...). He and his team meets a gorilla, a rhino and in the end even a couple of dinosaurs fighting each other! Their adventure leads back to Bangkok where one of two statues outside Wat Arun, Thosakan the demon guardian and a Chinese old man with a club becomes Godzilla-size and starts tearing down the scenery and slowly fighting each other!

Tah Tien is one of the most bizarre monster movies ever made, mostly because it completely lacks a coherent storyline and it seems like Sompote and his team just created scenes that I wanted to see in a movie, ignoring basic dramaturgy. Now, this is what I like. I like the chaos, the freedom. Sure, it's cheap and sometimes not very smart - just watch the comedy scenes - but that's the whole point. And it was a big success, not only in Thailand but in the rest of Asia. Just don't expect something of Toho-quality. This was Sompote's first movie and he was trying everything for the first time.

The monsters are very simple rubber constructions, some of them are probably just papier mâché (for example the rhino). The are stuff and hardly movie - but I think in the case of the statues at Wat Arun it's the meaning, because they are statues and not traditional living creatures. Yeah I know it's a movie, just trying to force some logic into everything here! ;) The miniatures are also very primitive, but it didn't stop Sompote from filming them in close-up and really showing us the goods. I like that. I hate when miniatures are used in the background. Even if they are primitive I want to see them!

Most people would probably loath Tah Tien but I can't get enough of stuff like this. It brings out the eight year old boy inside me - or at least his happiness over seeing a movie which just is fun, bizarre and fun. I'm not saying it's a movie for children, because it has both blood and nudity - but mixing that with family entertainment makes this movie even better!

When I was in Thailand I actually visited the area where the final of Tah Tien was shot, and I got a chance to meet one of the statues... but the wrong one!

In the last shot you can spot the one, on the right,
that's not doing anything in the movie!

I'm doing my best posing in front of the wrong statue.
Well done Fred!

Tiger from River Kwai (ข้ามาจากแม่น้ำแคว, 1975)

I smell a co-production here. Tiger from River Kwai is a western movie (probably) shot in Spain with an Italian crew starring a Thai movie star and a Hong Kong nobody as heroes plus an American actor doing his usual bad guy routine. And that's cool! Krung Srivilai is the Thai actor and Kam Won Lon, who I never heard of in my entire life, plays the other hero in this light-weight western-adventure directed by Franco Lattanzi. The Spaghetti Western Database mentions a Hong Kong producer, Fu Sheng, and it wouldn't surprise me if there was Thai money involved also. Why would they use a Thai actor and shoot scenes in Thailand? Like I wrote above, I can smell an international co-production miles away and here we have one.

Krung is playing a nice Thai guy who goes to America to deliver the ashes of a dead friend to his family. Well, not only that, but also an elephant statue filled with gemstones! Somehow a gang of bandits have heard this and they decided to rob the "Thailander", but they make a mistake and tries to rob a Chinese restaurant owner instead, Kam Won Lon, and this makes him involved in protecting his new Asian friend. But the bandits won't give up, and the leader (Gordon Mitchell) does everything in his way to get the stones... including innocent families and fucking around with the wrong sheriff... Luigi Montefiori!

Tiger from River Kwai is a quite entertaining western, but neither original or creative. Putting martial arts in westerns is nothing new and the odd thing for me is just putting a Thai and a Chinese together against Gordon Mitchell. THAT's original, but never makes any sense. It's even hard to understand why they would hook up and fight together. But Krung is a good actor, and one of the finest action actors from Thailand. He had a bit rougher look than Sorapong and Sombat and also played more unsympathetic characters (at least before Sombat decided to go more dark later in his career). Here he's very good in a western environment and his fistfight against Gordon Mitchell is hardly unique, but very good entertainment. What makes him more bizarre is the strange English dub they given him - some very odd accent, it's not Thai, that's for sure. But that Chinese dude has it even worse. He's dubbed by someone who sounds like a valium-drugged child-molester! Yeah, it's a very slimy and weak voice.

Also watch out for Luigi Montefiori, but his character is more of a cameo than anything else - but he's a nice addition to the cast if nothing.

Tiger from River Kwai is an interesting East meets West, but lacks the personality and spectacle it needed to be something special. Why not use more traditional Thai stuff? Why just let Krung kick around like some normal drunk? Why choose such a pale Hong Kong actor as... I already forgot his name? It's never boring, or badly made, it just needed that extra boost of... something. If I was the producer I would have taken Gordon Mitchell and his gang to Thailand, followed by Montefiori - and letting them be confused over a much more exotic and interesting country than the US. That would have resulted in some pretty interesting action sequences.

But hey, that's just my imagination! To see this movie you either have to own the VHS or download an VHS-rip, but rumour says that MYA Communications will release it on DVD, which would be awesome. I would be first in line to buy it!

The Thai actors in The Man from Deep River

I'm a big fan of Italian exploitation and today I watched Umberto Lenzi's groundbreaking cannibal-adventure The Man from Deep River. Shot in Thailand - the beginning in Bangkok and then the hero travels with train to the countryside (and I can spot a sign saying Wang Poh) and after getting himself he guide to travel out in the jungle he gets caught by a local tribe and... romance and cannibalism occurs. Like life itself.

Shooting in Thailand means Thai actors and there's a whole bunch of what I think is experienced, professional actors. The only one I know about is Pipop Pupinoy and he's hard to recognize without his trademark biker-moustache!

Here's the other Thai actors with bigger or more advanced parts. Their name is in the credits, but if someone can tell me more about them I would be grateful! 

I can swear I've seen this guy before - but where and what's his name?

Prapas Chindang

(?)

Song Suanhud

Sulallewan Suxantat

The Vampire (จอมเมฆินทร์, 1985)

In 1973 Sombat Metanee starred in his only, I think, vampire movie. Since then it's considered a lost movie and the last pieces of film probably deteriorated many years ago. What we're left with is posters, lobby cards and the nice photo that I've added last in this review - but maybe most important, the 1985 remake starring Thailand's favourite baddie Rith Luecha. So I decided to take a look at that version, the first Thai vampire movie I ever seen. But first of all, The Vampire is only a title I made up. If I translate จอมเมฆินทร์ it's "Private Cloud", and I have no idea what that means! After discussed it with friends and some thinking hear at home and decided to use this generic title until someone suggests a better one.

A crazy scientist with an eye so lazy it literary hangs out from its socket somehow makes a dangerous vampire, maybe even Dracula (Rith Luecha) comes alive again. Dracula quickly kills the old sleazebag with a bloody spear through the throat and infects another man with the vampie disease, so he can have himself a vampire-slave. Now he wants young female meat and starts to attack women every night until the villagers (it's always villagers in these movies!) decides they have to do something. A holy woman, armed with powerful magic, sets out to kill Dracula once and for all!

This is a very fun and entertaining movie, even if I don't get all of the story. Rith Luecha is not bad at all as the nasty vampire and seem to have a lot of fun with his fangs and cape, and being able to suck the blood from young virgins. The director goes all the way with scary eyes, shadows and jump cuts to make Dracula disappear. It's a good old-fashioned vampire-movie with more interest in entertaining than maybe telling a good story. Except the spear through the throat and a few squibs (in Thai movies from the eighties they always find an excuse for some traditional gun-fighting) it's not really blood, but cozy and silly - just like I expected it to be.

What I miss is maybe a castle, to make it even more old-fashioned than it is already. They could have used the crazy scientist more, maybe made him a slave to the vampire or something - but he's fun while he's alive at least.

Out on VCD from Lepso - and believe it or not, it's the same movie on the discs as on the cover, which with a release from this certain company can be quite rare nowadays. The quality is OK crap-quality. It's possible to watch, but expect a nice brutal headache after ninty minutes of blurry and dark vampire-action.

Taloompuk (ตะลุมพุก มหาวาตภัยล้างแผ่นดิน, 2002)

My hobby since my early teens is to watch every disaster movie made in the world. Nowadays it's getting harder and harder, not because there's not enough titles but because there's nothing stopping them from becoming more and more! Thanks SyFy Channel, you're ruining me! It's extra fun to watch non-American disaster movies and the Asian part of our world has been quite effective churning out big and small melodramas with natural disasters in a big supporting role. I've only seen one Thai disaster movie before, the extremly mediocre Tsunami 2022. So I was a bit worried when I put Taloompuk into the player...

Based on a true event when a tsunami caused a big disaster in Thailand during the fifties or early sixties. That's at least the backdrop to this classic love story. Almost a Romeo and Juliet, but between a young Buddhist man and a Muslim woman. Their families both opposes the relationship and most angry of them all are another man, maybe the brother of the woman. But the further the problem escalates between the families something is creeping up on them, a disastrous storm getting closer and closer... and soon they are in the middle of the eye storm fighting for their lives...

Taloompuk is in every way possible superior to Tsunami 2022. The latter one is mostly an excuse to blame the tsunami on gay corrupt politicans, and that's quite far from the truth. In this movie the disaster just is there, a part of life. The movie actually begins with something that looks like authentic photos from the real disaster, including dead bodies and destroyed houses. It sets the atmosphere pretty fast and when the rest of the movie is a very well-acted, serious and good drama without any form of exploitation it raises above a lot of other similar movies. Don't expect a wall-to-wall disaster movie, the first hour is spent on fleshing out the characters with romance and melodrama. But that also helps us care for the characters when the disaster strikes during the last 45 minutes.

The cast is good, but the only one I can identify is the excellent Chatchai Plengpanich - famous from the notorious Cannibal Mercenary, but also a well-known edgy character actor. One of my favourite actors together with Suchao Pongvilai (who actually starred in Tsunami 2022 if I don't remember it wrong).

So, how's the disaster? The film is focused on the human drama, but spends a lot of time in the disaster area during the disaster. We have some crumbling buildings, a huge tidal wave coming in over the town, lots of water and chaos - and a surprisingly effective decapitation in the middle of it all. It's spectacular and quite well-made, but this is not a movie about special effects or action. But I'll recommend it anyway, both to fans of good dramas and to disaster-aficionados. 

Tiger Show (พยัคฆ์ยี่เก, 1982)

Another day, another movie without subtitles. But what to expect from me? Here's an interesting film, Tiger Show, obviously a co-production between Thailand and Hong Kong with Sorapong Chatree and David Chiang in the leads. There's another Hong Kong actor playing the bad guy, but I can't for all the booze in the world remember his name or where I've seen him. Probably in a Shaw Brothers production. Pipop Pupinyo and Rith Luecha shows up doing their traditional baddies also, which is a pleasure as usual.

If I get the story right Sorapong is a stage actor, a traditional singer and dancer in a travelling theatre group. David Chiang is somehow involved in this also, or something related. Anyway, they're a rivals and always gets into fights and adventures with each other. But of course there's bad guys nearby and they try to steal (maybe) something from the group, my guess is something valuable they use in the show. This intensifies the attacks and soon it's a matter of life or death! Because the villains is using small airplanes to shoot harpoons from, killing everyone in sight!

A spectacular movie in every sense, this one deserves a restored release - I'm not even sure it's out on VCD or any other format. Maybe VHS? What the movie lacks in story because of lack of subtitles it regains with a lot of action. This actually has some quite impressive, but not original, fight scenes - both from Chatree and Chiang versus an army of henchmen. Like all Thai action movies from the eighties this also ends with a big battle at the bad guys camp with a lot of exploding tents and huts, people falling from guard towers and squibs. It's quite bloody in parts, with a couple of the typical Hong Kong blood squirts when swords hits a body (done by squeezing a bag of blood in your hand when you grasp the wound).

The most impressive stunts is the aerial footage with these small airplanes battling each other up in the sky plus some nice parachuting also! Not bad for a very obscure movie in other parts than Thailand. I think this also became a lakorn, a Thai TV-series 20-25 years later. So it must have been a big hit when it came.

When watching this it also strikes me how often Thai male actors have no problems with playing around with gender, sexuality, or just appearance. Sure, this is about Thai traditional theatre where make-up and choreography is very special, and in some ways effeminate. But I can't even count how many times I've seen Sombat Metanee doing his drag-routine or actors like Sorapong continue to do his more feminine acting style - just for fun, a good laugh, but they always takes it a little bit further than, for example, American movies. Just like when you see action heroes cry in Hong Kong and Japanese movies, it's easy to understand that being a man is not just being cold and brutal - it's about emotions and letting yourself go.

But that's a another story in Thai cinema and I'll leave it for now - or until I find a movie which deals with it specifically. Tiger Show was great movie, recommended. Good action, good actors and a lot of stolen music from Indiana Jones!