Killer Tattoo
Director: Yuthlert Sippapak
Year: 2001
Starring: Somchai Khemklad, Thao Rae, Mum
Jokmok, Thep Po-ngam, Theng Therdtherng
Time: 111 minutes
With a Hong Kong retro 1980’s B movie action
feel, this film manages to blast its way into your affections. It has at
times an unruly mix of comedy, melodrama and bullet ballet that seems a
bit chaotic and slapdash but is still entertaining and enjoyable. The final
twenty minutes is a rip it up all hands aboard shoot out that should bring
a smile to the face of most HK gunfight aficionados.
The setting takes place a few years into the future
and the city of Bangkok is in economic chaos with the foreigners (falangs)
having taken over many of the Thai corporations. Four over the hill killers
are mistakenly hired to kill one of the top cops in the law enforcement.
As a backup a fifth killer is also hired, the highly respected, Kid Silence.
The four killers (all top Thai comedians) have their sad backgrounds as
a hindrance – the Cheech lookalike killed his wife in an accident and her
ghost haunts his dreams, one of them dresses like Elvis and refuses to
speak anything but English (very bad English), another is broken-hearted
by a woman’s rejection and another has sad memories of his little girl
that he left behind many years ago. Kid has his demons as well – he witnessed
his mother being killed by a man with a tattoo on his arm when he was a
child and has been searching for that tattoo ever since to administer his
own justice.
The party of four and the lone killer all make
their hit at the same place and barely escape. The man who hired them decides
he wants them all dead and sends another group of professional killers
after them – one being a smart talking falang female in boots, halter and
an assortment of guns. In a Thai bordello of sweet dreams all the threads
and pasts of the men catch up with them in a fight to the death. The film
has a few slow parts in the middle and bogs down a bit in the flashbacks,
but is generally a fast moving tale of killing and memories.
Neither the Thai DVD or VCD have subs (I saw
it in a film festival with subs).
My rating for this film: 7.5