Defining New Thai Cinema through the Filmographies of Nonzee Nimibutr, Pen-ek Ratanaruang, Apichatpong Weerasethakul, and Wisit Sasanatieng
2024; University of Illinois Press; Volume: 76; Issue: 1 Linguagem: Inglês
10.5406/19346018.76.1.04
ISSN1934-6018
AutoresMaria Milagros Expósito-Barea, Miguel Ángel Pérez-Gómez,
Tópico(s)Cinema and Media Studies
Resumothis article explores thai cinema since 1997 to illustrate that New Thai Cinema, whose main directors are Nonzee Nimibutr, Pen-ek Ratanaruang, Wisit Sasanatieng, and Apichatpong Weerasethakul, constitutes a cinematic movement. The analysis examines the technical, artistic, and ideological aspects of these directors' work in relation to Thai cultural, economic, social, and political developments as well as Thai filmmaking in the 1990s and early 2000s, which was marked by a considerable decline in the number of local productions. From 1990 to 2000, the number of feature films produced in Thailand decreased year after year, until reaching a minimum of nine titles per year. The decline became more pronounced after 1997, partly due to the economic crisis that devastated the country and spread to most of Asia (Sungsri 131). Yet the sudden economic slowdown in Asia in 1997, prompted by the devaluation of the baht, did not eliminate the hopes of regeneration in film production; instead, "it was precisely at this point that Thai cinema experienced the start of its new upswing" (Chaiworaporn and Knee 60). The writings of Vincent Pinel, Joaquim Romaguera i Ramió and Homero Alsina Thevenet, and Scott MacKenzie help to clarify the sense in which New Thai Cinema is a film movement. Contextualized research on the four most prominent directors of the movement reveals their integral role in the Free Thai Cinema Movement (2007) that challenged Thai film censorship and changed the history of Thai cinema.The year 1997 was very significant for Thai cinema. As Chalida Uabumrungjit points out, [i]n the late 80s until the 90s, people kept saying that the Thai film industry was dying. It may have been just the right time or merely coincidence that many things did change in 1997. It was the year to celebrate the centenary of cinema history in Thailand. In fact, only 17 films were produced that year, but there were a few new filmmakers entering the film industry. Among them, Pen-ek Ratanaruang, Nonzee Nimibutr and Oxide Pang launched their first film in the same year.This phenomenon gave hope to the local film industry that there would be a renaissance. However, several factors contributed to the decline in the number of local productions, including the decrease in the import tax on foreign films. The reduction in film import fees in 1994, from 30 baht1 ($1.20) to 10 baht ($0.40) per meter of film, hurt the local industry and benefited that of Hong Kong (Chaiworaporn and Knee 59). More significantly, the number of American films in Thailand grew to unprecedented heights, and this was coupled with a sharp decline in releases by the local industry.Since the economic boom of the late 1980s and Thailand's entry into the global market, the middle class had come to regard Thai films as old-fashioned for the modern and renewed Thai society. In addition, most film companies made movies only for teenagers, so the population quickly adopted a Western standard of living and taste for Western products, especially from the US market. More than ever before, Hollywood films became a symbol of the new lifestyle, which affected the local film market and caused the decline in films from Hong Kong, Taiwan, and India. Patsorn Sungsri explains: In the 1990s, nang chewit (melodrama), nang sathorn sungkhom (social problem films), nang bu (action films), and nang wai ruen (teen films) declined in popularity. Political ideas were not present in the films as in previous decades.2 In this period there was more focus on urban life and people enjoying consumerism. Therefore, the stories of city life, the urban middle-class, and white-collar classes were introduced in many Thai films. (222)Another crucial change arose in the film industry when a new way to produce films emerged through semi-independent productions. Film production in Thailand was monopolized by the country's major entertainment companies until the mid-1990s. However, 1997 saw the appearance of films made independently up to the postproduction stage, although they would later be distributed in cinemas and in DVD format by the country's majors. Taking stock of Thailand's film industry in the mid-1990s, Anchalee Chaiworaporn and Adam Knee (64–65) analyze the production companies involved in film within the country's audiovisual industry. These include RS Promotion and Grammy Entertainment, both modestly sized studios focused on pop stars, television programs, and concert promotion. There are also major film production companies. They include Mongkol Film Company, active since the 1970s in local production, specifically in the horror genre, and in international distribution; Five Star Productions, also created in the 1970s but involved in several different genres; and Tai Entertainment, founded by the Pollworaruk family, a local movie exhibitor. In the 1980s this group changed the Thai cinema target audience to teenagers. Other new small production companies included Film Bangkok and Cinemasia. Nonzee Nimibutr founded Cinemasia, which initially handled Nonzee's films and those of Pen-ek Ratanaruang, but Nonzee also collaborated with Wisit Sasanatieng and the Pang brothers. There were also new independent production companies, such as Kick the Machine, cofounded by Apichatpong Weerasethakul, and Extra Virgin, cofounded by Pimpaka Towira, Ruengsang Sripaoraya, and Mai Meksawan (Boehler 30). Pimpaka was one of the first female directors in Thailand. Other women directors include Surapong Pinijkhar and Mingmongkol Sonakul, who created her own production company, Dedicate.In 1996, the Thai Film Foundation launched its short film festival, called Thai Short Film and Video Festival, with around fifty short film submissions in the first few years and more than 100 submissions from 2004 onward (Musikawong 250). Also, in April 1997, "the first Art Film Festival was arranged by private organizations to showcase the works of Thai film and arts students who had gone to study abroad; this festival marked the first Thai showing of the work of Apichatpong Weerasethakul—now a major figure in the Thai independent film scene" (Chaiworaporn and Knee 61). Highlighting another development, Natalie Boehler explains, "Many articles on recent developments in Thai film appeared in film journals and culture sections of international newspapers, often labeling it the 'Thai New Wave' or the 'Renaissance of Thai film' and using rather melodramatic jargon to imply the return of a national film culture" (11). This is largely due to the international and local success of the films of new directors; as scholars explain, "[i]n the early months of 1997, the industry was shaken up by the arrival of two unknown directors who had crossed over from work in television advertising, Pen-ek Ratanaruang and Nonzee Nimibutr" (Chaiworaporn and Knee 60).In 1997, Pen-ek Ratanaruang released Fun Bar Karaoke (Fan ba karaoke), a feature film that screened at the Berlin International Film Festival and other international festivals. This initiated talk about the director in European independent film circles, even though the film was not a box office success in Thailand. However, this is not the only important film from 1997; the surprise was Nonzee Nimibutr's Dang Bireley's and the Young Gangsters (2499 antapan krong muang), which succeeded in breaking box office records by amassing 75 million baht in five months (Chaiworaporn, "Nang Thai"). Nonzee also had his first film screened at the 41st London Film Festival (Harrison 322–23). Glen Lewis observes, "There was a renaissance in Thai filmmaking in the late 1990s. The revival began in 1997 with Nonzee's Daeng Bireley, which became the highest-grossing Thai film to that time. Two years later, his film Nang Nak earned seventy million baht in one week" (146).No one could have predicted that a director of commercials would achieve such success in the midst of the economic crisis. For Mary J. Ainslie and Katarzyna Ancuta, Dang Bireley's and the Young Gangsters is the film that separates the New Thai Cinema from the old Thai cinema. The general discussion of contemporary cinema begins with the introduction of the New Thai Cinema, which reflects the profound economic and cultural changes taking place in Thai society at the turn of the millennium and in the wake of the 1997 Asian crisis. This includes the promotion of nationalist discourses on Thai identity, as well as nostalgia for a perfect community as imagined in the past (Ainslie and Ancuta 5).The film's success was partly due to the controversy surrounding it. The film is based on real events from 1956. About two weeks after the film's release, some people depicted in Dang Bireley's and the Young Gangsters began appearing in the media to defend the accuracy of the information provided in it. This created interest among the public, particularly people who had been young in 1956 (Chaiworaporn, "Home, Nostalgia"). This success gave hope to the industry and predetermined a new group of directors. As Boehler states, [o]ne of the notable effects of the new movies was to gradually bring Thai people back into Thai movies, shifting audience segments from teenagers toward the inclusion of a more mature, diverse, educated audience. In the development of a more vital film culture, many parallel activities emerged simultaneously, adding possibilities for interrelations between people active in the field, both Thai and foreign. Film schools had more students enrolling. New film magazines, such as Bioscope, and websites were created; local media coverage of the film scene greatly increased. (12)Overall, there was a momentum that led to a broad revival of film culture, both conventional and alternative, providing a profitable context for local film production and its slow but steady rise since 1997. Chaiworaporn and Knee explain: The new energy in Thai film production did, nevertheless, gain momentum over the ensuing years, this development fed by a boost in Thai film culture more broadly (both mainstream and alternative, foreign and domestic) that got under way around the same time. For example, prior to 1997, there were only a few cultural institutions that provided opportunities for the public to appreciate film culture outside the mainstream. But this dearth of film activity unexpectedly and markedly began to change in 1997. (60–61)There was a revaluation of cinema based on cultural tradition and Thai heritage, which Adadol Ingawanij defines as "heritage film." Ingawanij's doctoral dissertation, Hyperbolic Heritage: Bourgeois Spectatorship and Contemporary Thai Cinema, analyzes what he defines as a "hyperbolic heritage" based on the rise of the middle class. This led to a new bourgeois sensibility and the institutionalization of Thai spectatorship. Ingawanij explains, "In domestic discourse, the heritage film is the most prestigious genre of industrial Thai films to have emerged since 1997. The market here signals both the economic crisis and the beginning of international interest in Thai cinema, which occurred amid the urban multiplex boom and the conglomerate monopoly consolidation of the Thai film industry" (11).One might ask whether New Thai Cinema involves a homogeneous group (or school) of directors or, conversely, a heterogeneous group belonging to a movement of people who differ greatly from each other but share a common goal. One also might ask whether New Thai Cinema involves a reaction by a group of creators to the reality of the cinema of their time or whether it also reflects a response to social conditions and the evolution of the other arts. In addition, one could ask if New Thai Cinema is linked to or based on a literary foundation, such as manifestos or articles that justify or expound needed changes or the responses the movement wants to express.Vincent Pinel explains, "Movements and schools have effectively arisen throughout the history of cinema to oppose the dominant conception and impose a new look and style. Although the schools bring together homogeneous groups of filmmakers often placed under the aegis of a strong personality . . . , the movements are made up of very different individuals grouped around a common goal" (13). Romaguera i Ramió and Alsina Thevenet also make a distinction between film schools and film movements. For these authors, both instances reflect the reaction of a group of creators to the cinema of their time, the contemporary social conditions, and developments in the other arts (103). Romaguera i Ramió and Alsina Thevenet also note that "these movements had a social or ideological affiliation, an attitude of commentary towards their country or their time" (103). In the case of Thai cinema, the filmmakers' multifaceted responses are visible, as the following section on the main directors and their works makes clear.Film movements are usually related to manifestos or articles about a group's concerns and objectives. It is common for manifestos to be seen as ruptures and challenges to the flow of politics, aesthetics, or history. Manifestos become calls to action for political and aesthetic changes in cinema and, equally important, the role of cinema in the world.Scott MacKenzie notes that one of the first manifestos was of a religious nature; the Decalogue, or Ten Commandments, establishes guidelines or rules of conduct that provide a basis for Western culture and its belief system (3). This is supplemented by citizens' rights bills and the constitutions of the different governments. One characteristic of film manifestos is that they frame "aesthetics as action"; in MacKenzie's words, "[o]ften considered a subset of aesthetics or mere political propaganda, film manifestos are better understood as a creative and political engine, an often unacknowledged force pushing forward a film theory, criticism, and history" (3).There are two ways of seeing manifestos. On the one hand, Janet Lyon argues that traditional modernist aesthetic and political manifestos are both exhortations to action and simultaneous attempts to eradicate dissent and debate. She explains, "The manifesto declares a position; the manifesto refuses dialogue or discussion; the manifesto fosters antagonism and scorns conciliation. It is univocal, unilateral, and single-minded. It conveys resolute oppositionality and indulges no tolerance for the faint hearted" (qtd. in MacKenzie 4). In contrast, Louis Althusser argues that the manifesto is more dialectical in nature, mediating between the past and the present, in the manner of "invocations: they call the future into being through a dialectical mediation of the present and the past" (qtd. in MacKenzie 5).In some cases, manifesto authors use polemics to rethink the nature of cinema. They might also consider the political or social relations that envelop society to delimit what cinema should be and how it can act within the public sphere, even if this occurs in a utopian or idealistic way. MacKenzie himself states, "Manifestos were most often texts of the moment. Intrinsically tied not only to the cinema, but to the world immediately surrounding the authors, manifestos have had, in most cases, quite short lifespans; they quickly left the world of political intervention and became that most aberrant thing (at least in the eyes of the writers themselves), a declawed aesthetic text" (9). One text that can be seen as a manifesto of Thai cinema is the letter of protest that Apichatpong Weerasethakul wrote to the National Legislative Assembly and the Thai government in 2007 over the censorship of one of his films, Syndromes and a Century (2006), by the Censorship Committee. The military coup of 2006 had curbed freedom of expression and secured an iron grip on politics and the media, once again instituting ruthless censorship, an issue to which members of the New Thai Cinema objected.The varied dimensions of the New Thai Cinema movement reflect distinctions among the films of Apichatpong Weerasethakul, Wisit Sasanatieng, Pen-ek Ratanaruang, and Nonzee Nimibutr. The characteristics of these directors' work have led scholars to identify these filmmakers as the heart of New Thai Cinema; some initial scholarship also has included the Hong Kong–born Pang brothers3 in the movement.Wisit Sasanatieng, Pen-ek Ratanaruang, and Nonzee Nimibutr all came from the world of advertising or television. Wisit began his career doing TV commercials but changed when he joined his classmate, Nonzee Nimibutr, and wrote the screenplays for Dang Bireley's and the Young Gangsters and Nang Nak (1999), both directed by Nonzee. Wisit released his first film in 2000, using a stylistic signature of saturated colors in Tears of the Black Tiger (Fah talai jone). His films are often described as nang naeo, or alternative films. The term naeo is associated with the postmodern characteristics recognized by film scholars. It should be noted that the materials used in Wisit's films are "vernacularly Thai but are also intertwined with representations of foreignness, marking an intertextual and post-modern style of filmmaking. A nostalgia for past 'Thai-ness' is combined with humour" (Ainslie and Ancuta 16). Tears of the Black Tiger is a melodramatic take on a Western, but it also contains references to postwar Thai cinema, the Thai star system, and Buddhism. It was the first Thai film officially selected for screening at the Cannes Film Festival, specifically in the Un Certain Regard section in 2001, a year before Apichatpong won the prize in this section with Blissfully Yours (Sud sanaeha, 2002).Wisit's next film, Citizen Dog (Mah nakorn, 2004), is a fantasy with hints of magical realism that also criticizes the urbanization and consumerism of the new millennium. It aligns with Apichatpong's social critique through the urban/rural dichotomy. In this film, the main character moves from a rural environment to the huge city of Bangkok, which serves as a metaphor in cinema for Westernization, consumerism, and the loss of traditional values. His next film is The Unseeable (Pen choo kab pee, 2006). This Gothic-inspired horror film alludes to the history of Thai cinema—in particular, adaptations of graphic horror novels costing ten satang (one baht). Wisit's first film based on another author's screenplay, The Unseeable was written by Kongkiat Khomsiri. It had a rather limited budget, despite its classic haunted house theme. The Unseeable involves a revaluation of genre cinema that is distinguished by new ways of paying homage to classic Thai cinematographic styles.In addition to his colorful romantic comedy, Western, and horror films, Wisit also has made an action film with an action hero. With Red Eagle (2010), he pays homage to the legacy of Thai action-adventure films of the late 1950s and 1960s as well as the great postwar Thai actor Mitr Chaibancha.4 The film was released in Thailand, coinciding with the fortieth anniversary of Mitr Chaibancha's death, at the express wish of the director, a fact that served to further mythologize the film, its fictional hero, and the actor. Some influence of Hollywood action-hero films can be found in it: the villains are part of a transnational crime organization, and the hero is a psychologically damaged and conflicted individual.In recent years, Wisit has continued to make films but in a somewhat leisurely fashion. He has been more successful writing screenplays, as has been his wife, Siriphan Taechachiadawong, with whom he wrote Tears of the Black Tiger and Citizen Dog. In 2015, he made a film for teenagers, Senior (Run Phee), which fuses horror with romance and references Japanese horror cinema, which is almost a subgenre of its own within Asian horror. In 2018, he continued with horror in the film Reside (Singsu), which mixes haunted house and possession tropes in a narrative about a mysterious ritual ceremony that is introduced inside a house.Since Pen-ek Ratanaruang's debut in 1997, the director has become renowned at home and abroad for his signature striking cinematography. His first films, Fun Bar Karaoke, 6ixtynin9 (Ruang Talok 69, 1999) and Monrak Transistor (2001), were among the productions that redefined local cinematography and contributed to the formation of what is now known as New Thai Cinema. Pen-ek was born in 1962, as was Nonzee, and his background shares certain similarities with Nonzee's. As Chaiworaporn points out, their works convey a desire for family or home, perhaps because they are children of the First National Economic and Social Development Plan of 1961. During this period, the Thai commercial sector sought to reduce imports and increase industrialization, which led to economic expansion in the kingdom during the 1960s (Chaiworaporn, "Home, Nostalgia" 118). Thailand achieved rapid growth from the late 1950s, but then, from the 1970s to the mid-1980s, the country suffered severe economic problems, including declining investment from the United States, rising budget deficits, spikes in oil prices, and above all, inflation. National politics also endured constant instability. During these years, the main thrust of development policy shifted from agricultural growth to economic growth and infrastructure construction. This led to a profound change in Thai society, as parents could no longer devote the same amount of time to their families because they were working to satisfy the demands of capitalism. Neither Nonzee nor Pen-ek grew up with their parents; rather, it was their grandparents with whom they shared their childhood.Pen-ek is among the most critically acclaimed Thai directors. He has received many awards and nominations from the Thai film industry. In the early 1980s, he studied at the Pratt Institute in New York and began working as a designer and illustrator. In 1993, Pen-ek started working at the Film Factory, a production company known for its commercial advertising work for Thai television. Pen-ek and Wisit both created advertising campaigns for the Film Factory, which would go on to produce films directed by each of the directors. Pen-ek's 1997 debut, Fun Bar Karaoke, narrates the two protagonists' longing for a happy family life. Pu (Fay Atsawet), twenty-four, has a low-level job at an advertising company, doing things like scouting for extras and working as a makeup artist, even though she graduated from the prestigious Chulalongkorn University. Her mother has passed away, and she lives with her playboy father. Pu falls in love with Noi (Ray MacDonald), who is a hired assassin sent to kill her father, an assignment that remains in the shadow of the characters' superstition and loneliness.Pen-ek uses the-mafia-as-something-ordinary as a recurring motif, portraying these figures as regular characters, who are so common that they seem to be boring, especially because they are hired assassins, bar waitresses, supermarket assistants, or other laborers who appear invisible as they live their mundane lives. In 6ixtynin9, Pen-ek's second film, a woman has just lost her job, but fate leads to a mafia gang mistakenly leaving a box of Mama-branded noodles full of money on her doorstep. From that moment on, every time the protagonist tries to find a solution to the problems she encounters along the way, she confronts new setbacks that further entangle the plot in characters and situations.Pen-ek always includes accidental meetings between people that make their lives change course. For him, human life is full of choices and "what if" moments. In Monrak Transistor, a young peasant boy is given the chance to become a music star, only to learn that all dreams may not be worth pursuing. In Last Life in the Universe (Ruang Rak Noi Nid Mahasan, 2003), a Japanese man with a desire to end his life finds solace in a seemingly unlikely female companion who appears to be his polar opposite. In Ploy (2007), Pen-ek reflects on the death of a relationship through a disillusioned married couple who encounter strangers acting as vehicles for sexual desires, jealousies, and dangerous obsessions. In Nymph (Nang mai, 2009), he uses the spirits of the forests to portray how relationships can deteriorate over the passage of time, even within marriage. In Invisible Waves (2006), he revisits crime but makes it international, chasing a Japanese gangster fleeing Macau for Thailand. In Headshot (2011), based on a novel by Thai author Win Lyovarin, he presents a hired assassin whose life is literally turned upside down due to a strange medical condition affecting his vision.In 2013, he released Paradoxocracy (Prachathipa'Thai), a sociopolitical documentary dealing with Thailand's political change caused by the democratization of Thai society in 1932. The nonfiction film reflects on the country's deep political divisions in the contemporary era. This film was censored and had a brief run in selected Bangkok cinemas. It made history as the first Thai film to be screened despite censors denying both the exhibition of and ticket sales for the film.Describing the narrative and visual style of Pen-ek's films, Chaiworaporn explains that "his movies have anti-narrative structures, utilize experimental cinematography and editing styles, and employ both natural and realist acting (later resulting in acting awards for most of his actors and actresses)" (113). Writing about connections between Pen-ek's temperament and films, Chaiworaporn observes, "At a personal level, the director is known as a man with a full sense of humor, satiric wit, and a sharp tongue—aspects of which can be found in most of his works" ("Home, Nostalgia" 113). Identifying Pen-ek's place in Thai cinema, Chaiworaporn notes that Pen-ek "has been considered as one of the brightest of the new generation of filmmakers. Like other filmmakers in the Thai new wave, when it comes to the construction of the plots and stories, he also continues the old Asian and Thai themes of 'the search for home' and 'the value of a strong family life'" ("Home, Nostalgia" 113). Put another way, Pen-ek's nostalgic approach to filmmaking features an idealization of classic Thailand.The filmmaking career of Nonzee Nimibutr involves a different path. After graduating in 1987 with a degree in design and audiovisual communication, he began his career in documentary production, worked in television producing scripts and editing television programs, and then moved on to the Rotfai Dontri (Music Train) Company. At this company, he was the producer and creative director of music videos, radio spots, and television programs. In the early 1990s, he established the Buddy Film and Video Production Company, which produced concerts, miniseries, and advertisements for advertising agencies. Nonzee is regarded as a key director of New Thai Cinema because his film Dang Bireley's and the Young Gangsters was a box office success even before it started circulating at international festivals. This film has a peculiar nostalgic discourse that combines representation of Buddhism, which is important in Thai culture and society, with conventions from Hong Kong gangster films made during the Cold War. According to Ainslie and Ancuta, "This was the beginning of Nimibutr's Thai-thae or vernacular Thai aesthetics that appealed to both national and international audiences" (8).In 1999, Nonzee released Nang Nak. This was a key year for Thai cinema, as it was the year new works, or second films by directors who had made their debut in 1997, were released. Nang Nak is a horror film based on a Thai folk legend about the ghost of Mae Nak, also known as Nang Nak, that paradoxically features a realistic representation of "Old Siam" in the mid-nineteenth century during the reign of Mongkut ruler King Rama IV. This film had a positive reception among general audiences, film students, and theorists in Thailand and beyond, winning the Best Film Award at the Asia-Pacific Film Festival.In 2001, Nonzee adapted the erotic period novel Jan Dara, continuing with the nostalgic spirit previously displayed in his works. Jan Dara came under fire from Thai censors because it had a high sexual content for Thai society, forcing its director to cut some scenes. With this film, he began his transnational collaborations by casting a Hong Kong actress, Christy Chung. From there, he participated in the film Three (Peter Ho-Sun Chan, Jee-woon Kim, and Nonzee Nimibutr, 2002); Nonzee directed one of the film's three sections, as did Korean director Jee-woon Kim and Hong Kong director Peter Ho-Sun Chan.Nonzee's next title, OK Baytong (2003), reflects his interest in the situation in southern Thailand, which borders Malaysia and has a Muslim tradition. The film's narrative, in which a Buddhist monk must take care of his Muslim niece, provides an opportunity for the director to reflect on ethnic and religious controversies. In 2008, he released Queens of Langkasuka, a fantastic, fictionalized history of the Pattani kingdom in southern Thailand, where pirates threaten to invade the kingdom's territories. Three queens of Langkasuka must unite to defend their lands and villages from the threat. The film has similarities to the Pirates of the Caribbean franchise (2003, 2006, 2007, 2011, and 2017) and the great Chinese epics.With Distortion (Khon Lohk Jit, 2012), Nonzee displayed his most experimental side in a psychological crime thriller. Nonzee was the producer of this title, as well as Wisit's Tears of the Black Tiger, Pen-ek's films Monrak Transistor and Last Life in the Universe, and films by other directors. He also chaired the Thai Film Directors Association before receiving the Silpathorn Award from Thailand's Ministry of Culture in 2008.Apichatpong Weerasethakul is regarded by national and international critics as one of the most influential directors in contemporary Thai cinema, due to the profound impact he has had on the development of independent Thai cinema in the last two decades. After completing his studies in the United States, Apichatpong return
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