Born to Fight

Director: Panna Rittikrai
Year: 2004
Starring: Choupong Changprung, Piyapong Piew-on (footballer), Amornthep Waewsang (gymnast), Suebsak Pansueb (takraw)
Time: ?

For fans of old fashioned black and blue non-wire/non-CGI action this latest Thai follow up to Ong Bak (the action choreographer of that film directs this one) for the "Are they Insane?" sweepstakes is an action junkies wet dream. It doesn't have the amazing Tony Jaa but it makes up for his absence by just revving it up a few notches and having many more people risk their mortal lives. The main protagonist - Choupong Changprung - isn't quite up to Jaa's action level either - or perhaps they just didn't give him a set piece like Jaa's chase through the streets of Bangkok to show it - but he is still as close to amazing as we will see these days. Where the film really punts your stomach into your throat though are the stunts which just plain and simple should be against the law but aren't we glad they are not!

The scariest stunt may have been the one in which a fellow is knocked off a truck and his head literally misses being crushed by a following truck by millimeters - but there are many other incredible bits as well. In the end credits some of these stunts are shown being practiced and then the real thing - they really should have something to the effect saying "we didn't want to damage dummies so we used real humans beings instead". Their crazy stunts are just amazing and like the old Jackie Chan films they are shown a few times from different angles just so the audience knows this isn’t CGI – this is the real deal.

The story like Ong Bak is about as basic 80's action as you can get and at least 80% of the running time must be taken up by action scenes. A drug lord is captured - during which a village is completely destroyed by a runaway truck - by a young cop. Afterwards the cop (Choupong Changprung) decides to go along with his sister to visit a small village in the notheast where she and other Thai athletes are giving away food and presents. And wouldn't you know it but the village is taken hostage by the drug lord's main henchman and about 100 of his followers and they demand his release. Oh and they have a nuclear weapon aimed at Bangkok.

Instead of our heroic cop doing a Bruce Willis Die Hard as I fully expected though, the entire village down to the children turn on their captors and all hell breaks out for about 40 minutes of maiming, killing and other assorted acts of destruction. The athletes are played by well-known Thai athletes and they use their skills – soccer, rugby and gymnast – to fight back. The gymnast (Amornthep Waewsang) does some astonishing flips and somersaults usually with some bad guys head at the receiving end. This isn't quite the same kick as Ong Bak was in seeing Jaa simply blow your mind with his physical skills and Muay Thai ability, but this admittedly somewhat crude and super patriotic (the up until then docile villagers decide to rebel when the national anthem plays on the radio) was a hell of a lot of brutal fun. Keep small children far away from this one.

For an article on the director, check out this page.

My rating for this film: 7.5


Garuda

Director: Monthon Arayangkoon
Cast: Sarah Legge, Sonram Teppinat, Daniel Fraser
Year: 2004
Running Time: 108 minutes

“Garuda is a mythical bird with the head and wings of a phoenix and the body and limbs of a man. He is said to be the vehicle of Lord Vishnu. He plays an important role in Hindu and Buddhist mythology. In countries like Thailand, where the national religion is Buddhism, Garuda is revered as a deity”*. The Garuda is part of the Royal Flag of Thailand and is a revered figure and so when this film was made there were some negative rumblings that this was disrespectful – but the film went on to be a hit at the box office

Thailand has a bit of a tradition of monsters in films that usually revolved around their mythical creatures, but this film feels much more like a play for the modern audience that are fans of Japanese Kaiju Eiga films starring Godzilla and Gamera. This isn’t up to the recent films of those two in terms of entertainment or production values, but it still has some fun contained within though it would have felt much fresher if it had been made fifteen years ago. Throw some influences from “Predator” and “King Kong” into this film as well. The main problems with this film though are that the three main characters are more than a little irritating and unsympathetic and there is a tendency of the narrative to eat up time and slow the film to a crawl with side issues around being “Thai” enough.
They are digging deep into the earth in order to build a subway in Bangkok when they come across something strange that is impeding their way*. With evidence that it may be an ancient artifact, they call in a half Thai/half French female archeologist and her male farang co-worker to take a look at it. When these two get to the site though they discover that an elite very hostile military group has been brought on the scene as well – “God Killers” as one of them later describes themselves. The reason for their presence soon becomes apparent as a giant Garuda has been discovered and it doesn’t seem pleased to have been awoken – sort of like me on a Sunday morning - and it is soon hunting them down through the caves and tunnels beneath the earth.
The Garuda though seems to have an attraction for the archeologist though and one can’t really blame it as she (Sarah Legge) is quite attractive when she is not whining. Unfortunately, she spends a good portion of the film doing just that while the farang (westerner) is forced to make dorky expressions throughout the film. This is not a very farang friendly film and even though she is half Thai it’s not Thai enough for the natives. Eventually, the Garuda comes above ground and creates havoc in the city – demolishing much of MBK Center (a very cool mall) and flying through the sky. The special effects aren’t bad, but you know a film is in trouble when the monster is more likable than the humans you are suppose to be rooting for.

* Bangkok is basically built on a swamp and for that reason their metro system – the Sky Train – was built above ground – so the chances of really discovering a Garuda underground in Bangkok are very slight!

My rating for this film: 6.0

The Story of the X-Circle

Director:
Stars: Bongkot Kongmalai, Leo Put
Time: ? minutes
Year: 2004

This mildly distasteful film seems to serve little purpose other than perhaps pushing the boundaries of what is allowed as sexual content in Thai films (in particular ones that play in theaters as opposed to the straight to video ones in which censorship seems more lax). Thailand has been fairly conservative regarding nudity in films in the past, but this appears to be going by the wayside very quickly. This film has a number of female nude scenes as well as being completely awash in perversely sexual behavior that aims to be amusing to some extent but is so loaded down with non-stop crassness that it ends up being tedious and leaving a bad taste in your mouth. Hey, I am as big a fan of masturbation scenes as anyone, but by the umpteenth display of up and down hand motions with guys moaning in distorted ecstasy even a good thing loses its rosy luster.

There is a huge demand for pornography on the streets of Bangkok apparently - especially of the hidden cam variety - but it is not strictly legal and has gone underground. X-man (Leo Put) is doing his best to supply these needs with material for their private moments by secretly filming intimate moments of people. The cops are ineffectively trying to crack down on this porno ring so they bring in their super weapon - Bongkot Kongmalai (Bang Rajan, Kunpan) - to help them out. Bongkot is certainly one of the more alluring females in Thai film today - sensually voluptuous with deep set eyes, she brings the camera to a full halt at times with her ample cleavage and blank but inviting stare. Acting talent may not run deep in her blood but she nearly shimmers on the screen with pent up sexuality.
A secret society of porno perverts has formed and they meet in a dank basement to talk about their favorite stars and scenes – kind of like a sports bar full of heterosexual males bonding over their teams. They all unanimously decide that they want a hidden cam tape of China – a top model with long legs and an engaging smile and they plead with X-man to get one. He parks himself across from her building in an abandoned construction site and waits for her to reveal herself and all of a sudden all the members of the pervert society show up as well and this leads to a mass masturbation scene that I didn’t really need to see. Throw in some corrupt cops, a romance between X-man and Bongkot and the daily lives of some of these perverts and you end up with an idiotic hodgepodge of a film that just didn’t seem to know what it wanted to be other than racy and controversial.

My rating for this film: 4.0