Bang Rajan: Legend of the Village
Warriors
Director: Thanit Jitnukul
Year: 2001
Starring: Winai Kraibutr, Bin Bunluerit, Jaran
Ngamdee, Chumphorn Thepphithak, Bongkot Kongmalai
Time: 119 minutes
The year is 1765 and once again the Burmese
Kingdom to the west is invading Thailand. The overwhelming Burmese force
is descending from the north heading for the capital of Ayothaya and only
the small nearly unnoticeable rural village of Bang Rajan lies in its way
of victory. The people of Bang Rajan pick up their cleavers, their swords,
their farm implements, their bows and arrows and stop the Burmese in their
tracks for five long and bloody weeks before they are defeated. To the
Thais this is their Alamo – a tale full of valor and the ultimate sacrifice
from the men and women of Bang Rajan for the love of their country. It
is stirring, ferocious and delivers an accumulated emotional wallop that
will leave you saddened and stunned.
It is an epic film in its ambition and its themes.
It has often been compared to Braveheart – but it has twice the masculinity
and three times the action. Where Braveheart may score points though is
that it focuses on one man and thus engenders a great deal of sympathy
for his character, while Bang Rajan disburses its story among a number
of the villagers and thus is unable to make the characters much more than
stereotypes. This appears to have troubled a number of reviewers, but seemed
unimportant to me – it’s the collective story, the collective heroism and
the collective tragedy that matters here and by the final balls to the
wall charge it had ripped a huge hole in my stomach.
The action is extremely graphic and brutal – much
of it done with razor sharp cleavers and rarely does more than a short
time go by without someone losing their head. There are a number of smaller
stories that unfold as well – the drunk who finds redemption, a romance
blooms among the killing and the deep love of a woman for her husband and
is at his side in the final charge.
Neither the Thai DVD or VCD has English subs
(I saw it at a film festival).
My rating for this film: 8.5
Kunpan: Legend of the WarLord
Director: Thanit Jitnukul
Year: 2002
Starring: Watchara Tangkaprasert (Kunpan),
Bongkot Kongmalai (Pim)
Time: 115 minutes
I watched this film from the director of Bang
Rajan sometimes in fascination, sometimes in confusion and sometimes in
dismay. It is a total mishmash of good and bad scenes. In the end it felt
like a good idea gone bad – but bad in a very strange and peculiar manner.
Though epic in its scope, it still manages to plod at times with a plot
out of a Thai soap opera that just diminishes everything around it. The
film is based on a classic story and so perhaps to the Thai people this
story takes on a special meaning, but as it plays out here it has very
little emotional impact until the final scene reaches out and grabs you
by the throat. The main fault with enjoying the film is the character of
Kunpan – are we suppose to sympathize with him or detest him? In theory
he is the hero of the film, but his occasional repulsively moral acts make
it difficult to care a lot about his fate.
In the 1700’s Kunpan’s father is a highly regarded
warrior, but he makes the mistake of bringing too many oxen to the king
and it’s off with the head – and Kunpan and his mother run for their lives.
He is brought up in a temple and gains great strength and a few magical
powers. When he is a young man he returns to his home as a monk – but one
look at the ravishing and soft-spoken Pim and he quickly gives up his calling
and marries her. Apparently though in his days as a monk he stored up more
chestnuts than his wife could handle and the morning after their wedding
night he is on the dock making hay with one of the servant girls. Huh?
This is a totally bizarre moment – one second he is deeply in love with
Pim and the next knocking knees with a woman in broad daylight. Pim seems
annoyed but understanding. Other bizarre episodes continue throughout the
film.
The King of Thailand (the same one who executed
his father) hears about Kunpan’s return and takes the advice of the rival
for Pim’s heart and sends Kunpan off to fight his enemy in the north. The
rival hopes that Kunpan will find death but instead he defeats the enemy
and wins himself a second wife. Pim seems annoyed but understanding when
he returns home with the wife in tow. The King is an irritable person though
and Kunpan is soon banished off into the jungle – where of course he finds
yet a third wife – a cutie pie who bears him (well not exactly bears) a
demon fetus that can fly through the air and kill whomever Kunpan wants.
Kunpan returns and is soon back in the good graces of the King –
for about fifteen minutes until he again gets annoyed with Kunpan and this
time Kunpan goes off to jail – for many years – but oddly no one ever seems
to age much. Throughout the film this triangle between Kunpan, Pim and
the rival drive the film – but where it is driving it is difficult to discern.
The cinematography is fine, the sets are excellent, there are a few big
battle scenes (but very poorly executed considering the director did so
much better in Bang Rajan) – but the stilted acting from the two men and
a weak story line makes this film feel like a lost opportunity and very
silly at times.
The Thai DVD has English subs, the VCD does
not.
My rating for this film: 6.0
Suriyothai
Director: Prince Chatri Chalerm Yukol
Year: 2001
Starring: M.L. Piyapas Bhirombhakdi (Queen
Suriyothai), Johnny Anfone, Marisa Anita, Sorapong Chatri , Siriwimol Charoenpura,
Ronrittichai Khanket
Time: 210 minutes (Thai version)
Prince Chatrichalerm Yukol has been one of
Thailand’s premiere directors since his debut film in 1972 with “It Comes
with the Darkness”. A distant member of the royal family, he studied film
at UCLA and has directed some thirty films of which “The Elephant Keeper”
and “Kong” have met with some international recognition. Nothing that he
had done though was nearly on the same scale as Suriyothai. This is an
enormous film detailing 20 years of history on a grand colorful canvass
– it took 2 years to make and used over 2,000 extras, some 80 elephants
and 70 horses in the production. A painful attention to historical detail
was sought and the film revels in the magnificent costumes, the ornate
decorations, the stunning temples and palaces, the elegant décor
and the formal manner in which people composed themselves at that time.
From this perspective, Suriyothai is an extremely impressive achievement
and is worth seeing just for the spectacle alone.
In other ways though the film fails on some basic
levels. In the first cut the running time came in between seven and eight
hours and the director had to pare it down to about 3 ½ hours and
perhaps something was lost in doing so (of course Coppolo is now cutting
it even further for a possible US release). For all of its rich detail,
there is little attention paid to developing the characters beyond simplistic
notions of honourable or dishonourable. Everyone is basically a cardboard
character and there is absolutely no sense of intimacy brought into their
lives. As such, the film never pulls you in emotionally – it plays out
more like a very interesting big budget recreation on the History Channel
as the narrator describes the unfolding of historical events and they are
re-enacted on screen. But it is wonderful pageantry – the charging of the
elephants, the storming of fortresses, the regal barges floating down the
river, the palace crowd scenes are all terrific stuff.
I would actually love to see this on the big screen
and actually would love to see the entire 8 hours (though not at one sitting!)
to see if more character development takes place - and I am certainly curious
to know what was edited out. The film is not perhaps the easiest to follow
(in particular to those with little knowledge of Thai history such as myself)
as there are many characters introduced, many factions to keep track of
and simply trying to understand the relationship of everyone is a bit taxing
but doable. There is also a sudden transition in which all the young actors
are replaced by older ones and Suriyothai seems to have aged 20-years in
a four year jump.
In general, the film tells the tale of the monarchy
over a period of 20-years and it is filled with intrigue, struggles for
power and betrayal – sort of a Thai “I, Claudius”. The film begins in the
year of 1528 and at the time the Kingdom was divided into two areas that
were ruled by brothers from the Suphannaburi dynasty and all was quite
peaceful. One ruled in the north in Pitsanulok and the other ruled in Ayothaya
to the south. Princess Suriyothai is from another line of the royal family
– the Phra Ruang dynasty – and she is in love with a distant cousin – Lord
Pirin. She is chosen though by the Crown Prince Tien to be his wife and
she becomes his loyal and able supporter and advisor. Within four years
though the royal family begins to unravel – the death of both brothers
in a short time span leads to the country being lead by a small boy and
Prince Chai Raja (Prince Tien’s brother) leads a coup to bring the entire
country under his rule. After his wife dies in childbirth though, he takes
a consort – Princess Srisudachan – from the royal line of U-thong. This
is when the film starts getting quite intriguing as she conspires to bring
her family back into possession of the throne and will stop at nothing
to do so – and has a small group of female assassins to do her dirty work.
Prince Tien and Suriyothai are seen as obstacles and she sends ninja like
killers (Khmer assassins) to eliminate them.
In reality, there is very little known about the
life of Suriyothai – basically only her heroic death (which is where the
film actually begins) has been recorded – so the director admits that much
of the screenplay is fictional though I believe much of the historical
background is based on fact. It’s an interesting film – never particularly
gripping or involving – but far from dull as it moves at a rapid pace –
and it has some great moments and heroic characters.
The film is available on Thai DVD and VCD with
subtitles.
My rating for this film: 7.5
