Bangkok Cinema Scene: March 24-30, 2016

Batman v Superman: Dawn of Justice

Good old Batman. Just a regular dude, looking out for the rest of us mere mortals. He's always suspicious, always wary. And for every superhero or supervillain that emerges from outer space or out of a vat of chemicals, Batman studies their powers and abilities and methodically comes up with ways to defeat them, just in case.

Superman is his biggest test yet. Who is this guy in the red cape? Where does he come from? How does he get his powers? Batman, the Great Detective, figures it out in Batman v Superman: Dawn of Justice.

Controversially, this latest version of Batman is played by Ben Affleck, who takes over the iconic role from Christian Bale, who portrayed the Cape Crusader in the Dark Knight Trilogy of Christopher Nolan. Having already been featured in the comic-book rodeo, playing a lackluster Daredevil years ago (the Netflix series does Daredevil justice), his reading of Bruce Wayne/Batman is a world-weary, been-there-and-done-that type. It seems the brooding darkness of the Nolanverse is carrying over into the DC Extended Universe.

But it's the comic-book-crazy 300 and Watchmen director Zack Snyder who helms this latest iteration, carrying on his meticulous and devoted panel-by-panel work from Man of Steel, which introduced Henry Cavill in the role of Superman and his bespectacled alter-ego newspaper reporter Clark Kent.

Here, Warner Bros.' DC Comics movie franchise takes further shape as it seeks to match Disney, Marvel Comics and the Avengers. Not only does this movie have the essential element Batman but they also rope in Wonder Woman (Gal Gadot, making her debut) and arch-nemesis Lex Luthor (Jesse Eisenberg). Jeremy Irons joins as Bruce Wayne's butler and crime-fighting partner Alfred, with Amy Adams, Laurence Fishburne and others continuing in their roles from Man of Steel. It's all in service of the eventual Justice League movie, but first we'll get Suicide Squad and standalone films for Wonder Woman, Aquaman, The Flash and others.

Critics have been desperate to trash this film since it was first announced. They don't care for Snyder, aren't crazy about Cavill as Superman and have mixed feelings about the Batfleck. Warner Bros. kept them at bay, imposing strict embargoes. But the reviews are starting to trickle in. It's in converted 3D in some cinemas, including IMAX. Rated 13+

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Also opening

Risen – Praise Jesus. Our cinemas become churches in observance of Easter Sunday. In Judea in 33AD, veteran Roman military tribune Clavius (Joseph Fiennes) begins to question his beliefs and spirituality as he works to uncover the truth of what happened to a certain crucified troublemaker. Basically, it's a straight-faced and faith-based version of the movie-within-the-movie that George Clooney was making in Hail, Caesar! Cliff Curtis and Tom Felton also star. It's directed by Kevin Reynolds, who is best known for his work as Kevin Costner's go-to guy (he actually called action on the famed buffalo-hunt scene in Dances with Wolves). Critical reception is mixed, with praise for the performance by Fiennes. Rated 13+

Trumbo – One of Hollywood’s highest-paid screenwriters, Dalton Trumbo, is caught up in the anti-communist crusades in the 1950s and is banned from working. Friends turn their backs on him, he's sent to prison and he veers toward financial ruin, but he continues to produce award-winning scripts, giving the credit to others or writing under a pseudonym. Bryan Cranston stars and he earned Academy Awards and Golden Globe nominations for his portrayal. Helen Mirren is the scandal-addicted columnist Hedda Hopper, and she also earned a Golden Globe nomination. Other stars include Louis C.K., Alan Tudyk, Diane Lane, Michael Stuhlbarg and John Goodman. Critical reception is generally positive. It's in limited release, playing only at the Lido in Siam Square.

Rocky Handsome – Rock-hard abs and explosions combine in this violent Bollywood thriller starring John Abraham and his gym membership. He's a father who embarks on a deadly rampage of revenge after his adorable little eight-year-old daughter is killed. It's in Hindi with English and Thai subtitles at Major Cineplex Sukhumvit, Rama III and Pattaya. Opens Friday.

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Also showing

Salaya International Documentary Film Festival – The Thai Film Archive's sixth annual documentary fest opens at 1pm on Saturday with The Scala, a 50-minute made-for-TV piece by Thai filmmaker Aditya Assarat, who takes his cameras inside Siam Square's imperiled landmark cinema for what he reckons is one last look around. The Scala is part of a special Power of Asian Cinema package, co-produced by the Busan International Film Festival and Korean Broadcasting. Other programs are Sense and Sensibility, which groups together documentaries by female directors, and the Asean Documentary Competition, which has entries this year from Vietnam, Myanmar, Singapore, the Philippines and Indonesia. A major highlight is The Memory of Justice, a 1976 film that looked at wartime atrocities, by the Germans in World War II, and by the Americans in Vietnam. Running 278 minutes, the film was recently restored and presented at last year’s Toronto International Film Festival. Another marathon screening will be Homeland: Iraq Year Zero, an award-winning chronicle of everyday life in Iraq before and after the U.S. invasion. It runs 334 minutes and will be presented in its entirety. The fest is at the Film Archive in Salaya, Nakhon Pathom, from Saturday through Monday, and then from Tuesday shifts over to the Bangkok Art and Culture Centre, where it runs through April 3. The schedule is embedded below. You can state your interest in attending the opening film and ceremony on the Facebook events page. For more details, please check the fest's Facebook page.

The Friese-Greene Club – There's one more scheduled screening on Saturday of Trump: What's the Deal?, a revealing 1999 documentary that is reportedly "the movie Trump doesn't want you to see." A specially licensed screening, the cost is 150 baht. The place has a private event tonight, but is back open tomorrow with the controversial erotic thriller Irreversible by Gaspar Noe and a Douglas Slocombe cinematography effort in the historical drama Lady Jane on Sunday. Next Wednesday, there's one more great Danish film, 1994's Nightwatch, starring Nikolaj Coster-Waldau (Game of Thrones) as a morque watchman who gets caught up in a murder case. Shows are at 8pm. The FGC is down an alley next to the under-renovation Queen's Park Imperial Hotel on Sukhumvit Soi 22. For more details, check the club's Facebook page.

Alliance Française – A young man sets out to find his missing grandmother, who escaped from an old-folks home, in Les souvenirs (Memories). It screens at 7pm on Wednesday at the Alliance.

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Take note

The Bangkok Art and Culture Centre has posted the line-up for this year's Cinema Diverse: Director's Choice series, taking the added theme of The Female Perspective and recruiting prominent female Thai filmmakers to show thought-provoking films and then talk about them. The opener is on May 21, with Soraya Nakasuwan showing The Pearl Button from Chile. Others will be twin-sisters Wanweaw and Weawwan Hongvivatana on July 23, producer-director Pimpaka Towira on September 24 and producer-director Anocha Suwichakornpong on November 19.

An article in The Nation last Friday details efforts by researcher Philip Jablon and the Southeast Asia Movie Theater Project to raise awareness about the plight of old movie palaces. It includes updates on the Lido and Scala, which will now hopefully remain open through 2018, as well as two old, shuttered standalone cinemas, The Prince and the Nang Loeng, that could reopen.

Meanwhile, Khao Sod English had a recent article on strong-arm practices being used by theater owners to force movie distributors into paying for ads in newspapers. The story says that distributors who didn't make the big ad buys found their films trounced out of cinemas in favor of movies by distributors who did pay. Explains a lot about how things work in Thai cinemas and why some movies tend to be harder to track down than others. If you are a smaller, independent distributor, you are going to have to work harder to keep your movie in front of eyeballs.

Bangkok Cinema Scene: Movies opening September 10-16, 2015

Gerontophilia

Attendees of the now-defunct Bangkok International Film Festival in 2008 might remember a weird movie called Otto: Or Up with Dead People, an offbeat musical comedy about a gay zombie that featured explicit sex scenes.

And as far as I recall, that's the last time a Bruce LaBruce movie played publicly in Bangkok, until now. This week brings a light-hearted 2013 effort from Canada's taboo-challenging cult director, the romantic comedy Gerontophilia, which covers the sexual awakening of a young man (Pier-Gabriel Lajoie) as he discovers he has a fetish for elderly men. To nurture his new obsession, he takes a job in a nursing home and develops a special bond with one of the patients.

The film has been brought in by the new indie distribution shingle Doo Nang Took Wan, run by Ken Thapanan Wichitrattakarn, a public-relations professional who got into the movie business a few months ago when he single-handedly brought the Brazilian coming-of-age gay drama The Way He Looks to Bangkok.

Critical reception has been mixed. It's at the Lido. Rated 18+

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Also opening

No Escape – Owen Wilson, not content to wait by the phone for his buddy Wes Anderson to call, stars as a water engineer who has moved with his family to an anonymous, strife-torn Southeast Asian country. There, wherever that is, a rebellion breaks out and the family become targets as anti-foreigner sentiments boil over. Lake Bell and Pierce Brosnan also star. There have been at least a couple controversies over this production, which had the working title of The Coup when it was being made in northern Thailand a year or so ago. One was when Wilson posed for a photo with whistle-blowing anti-government protesters. There was also a fuss over the signage in the film, which in a desperate move by the country's film minders to strip any Thai identity out of the picture, so as to not harm tourism, was written in Khmer and turned upside down. That has led to No Escape being banned in the newly emerging cinema market of Cambodia, amid rumors that it would be banned in Thailand as well. No such luck. Critical reception has been mixed. It's by the writer-director pair of John Erick and Drew Dowdle, who previously did the found-footage thrillers Quarantine and As Above, So Below. Rated 15+

SPL 2: A Time for Consequences – Thai martial-arts star Tony Jaa makes his much-anticipated debut in a Hong Kong action film. He's a tough Thai cop who has taken a job as a prison guard while he tries to raise money to pay for his sick daughter's treatment. On the job, he's assigned to watch over a prisoner (Wu Jing) who is actually a Hong Kong police officer who has gone way undercover in a relentless bid to bring down the head of a human-trafficking ring. Louis Koo and Simon Yam also star. Cheang Pou-soi (Dog Bite Dog, Motorway) directs. This is a sequel-in-name-only to the terrific 2005 Hong Kong crime thriller SPL: Sha Po Leng, which had Donnie Yen throwing down with the formidable Sammo Hung. Wu Jing was in that one too, but played a different character. A box-office success in China, critical reception for SPL 2 has been fairly positive – much better than for Jaa's English-language debut Skin Trade, which I actually kinda liked. SPL 2 is Thai-dubbed only with English subtitles. Rated 18+

The Assassin – Taiwanese auteur Hou Hsiao-Hsien returns with his first movie in eight years, and his very first wuxia martial-arts drama. It's set during the olden days of the Tang Dynasty. Shu Qi stars as a young woman who returns to the village where she was born, and sent away from as child. Training since then as an assassin, she is out to redeem herself after botching a previous job. But this one isn't going to be easy, as her new target is the man she had been arranged to marry. Chang Chen also stars. After making a buzzworthy premiere at the Cannes Film Festival, where it won the best director prize, critical reception has been generally positive. It's in Mandarin with English and Thai subtitles at Apex, House, Major Ratchayothin, Major Rama III, Paragon, Quartier CineArt and SFW CentralWorld. Rated 15+

Assassination – Not to be confused with China's The Assassin, this South Korean period drama deals with a ragtag team of resistance fighters under Japanese occupation in the 1930s. Lifting a page from The Dirty Dozen, they are condemned criminals who have been let out of prison with top-secret orders to kill the Japanese army’s commander. Critical reception has been favorable. It's in Korean with English and Thai subtitles at Esplanade Ratchada, Major Ratchayothin, Paragon and Quartier CineArt. Rated 18+

Self/less – A terminally ill elderly billionaire buys a chance for eternal life through an underground experimental medical procedure that transfers his consciousness into the cadaver of a younger man. He's played by Ryan Reynolds. Tarsem Singh, slumming it since the hyperstylishness of The Cell, directs. Critical reception has been mostly negative. Rated 15+

The Shamer’s Daughter – There's swords and sorcery in this adaptation of a best-selling Danish young-adult fantasy novel by Lene Kaaberbol. It's about a supernaturally gifted young woman who has to uncover the truth when her realm's heir to the throne is wrongfully accused of killing his family. Seems it is Thai-dubbed only. Rated 15+

Cub – Kids are in peril in this Belgian import about Cub Scouts camping in the woods becoming prey for a local poacher and his feral son. It's at SF cinemas only, and according to the soundtrack information I've been given, it's in Flemish and French with English and Thai subtitles.

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Also showing

The Friese-Greene Club – Tonight, a mathematician becomes increasingly paranoid and obsessed as he tries to find meaning in a mysterious numerical sequence in Pi, the debut feature of Darren Aronofsky. And tomorrow it's the directorial debut of Robert Redford, 1980's Academy Award-winning Ordinary People. And another classic shows on Saturday, Terrence Malick's debut Badlands. It's still his best film. Sunday has a special screening of the 1997 comedy As Good As It Gets, with a member of the assistant director team, Robert Neft, sharing behind-the-scenes stories of working with director James L. Brooks, star Jack Nicholson, Helen Hunt and Greg Kinnear. And next Wednesday is Android, a low-budget 1982 robot drama that B-movie producer Roger Corman passed on. It went on to be a critically acclaimed sleeper hit. Shows are at 8pm. The FGC is down an alley next to the under-renovation Queen's Park Imperial Hotel on Sukhumvit Soi 22. For more details, check the club's Facebook page.

Behind the Painting – Time to get out of the cinema and into the art gallery, as the interesting and talented video artist and filmmaker Chulayarnnon Siriphol offers his interpretation of the classic Thai story Behind the Painting. Set in Japan, the tragic romance involves a young Thai student who has been employed by an elderly Japanese man to look after his young blue-blooded Thai wife. Written in 1937 by popular author Sri Burapha, the novel has been adapted for film, television and stage many times, including a 2001 film version that was the last feature by the revered Thai auteur Cherd Songsri. In an homage to Cherd, his film is woven into the fabric of Chulayarnnon's entertaining experimental work, which has him hilariously portraying both the young man and, in the grand tradition of theatrical cross-dressing, the young woman. I've actually seen this, in a Film Virus retrospective last year, and I told Chulayarnnon afterward that I don't feel I need to see any other version. Definitely worth a look. It was created last year during Chulayarnnon's participation in the artist-in-residence program at the Aomori Contemporary Art Center in Japan. Organized by the Japan Foundation and curated by the Aomori center's Hiroyuki Hattori, Behind the Painting is at the Silpakorn University Art Center, opening tomorrow night (invitation only) and running until October 10. Directions to the gallery are available online.

Alliance Française – There are two French film to list this week. First up is a family friendly animated feature at 2pm on Saturday, 2012's Moon Man, in which the Man in the Moon grows bored and goes sightseeing across the universe. Meanwhile, none of the children on Earth can fall asleep because the Moon Man is missing. And next Wednesday's usual screening is 2013's Un château en Italie (A Castle in Italy), written, directed by and starring Valeria Bruni Tedeschi. The semi-autobiographical yarn has a woman re-energized by love in her life. Meanwhile, her wealthy industrialist family is crumbling around her. It screens at 7pm on Wednesday, September 16, at the Alliance.

Bangkok Cinema Scene: Movies opening July 9-14, 2015

Y/our Music

Urban and city beats blend in the tuneful documentary Y/our Music, which finally comes to Bangkok cinemas after a spin on the festival circuit.

I've seen it twice, and it kept my toes tapping both times. Directed by David Reeve and Waraluck “Art” Hiransrettawat Every, Y/our Music is a bifurcated look at Thailand's social divide through the benignly harmonious prism of music.

In Bangkok, there's an esoteric blend of city folk, playing Western-influenced folk, jazz and rock, while in the countryside, there are National Artists, performing the traditional Isaan country-folk music of mor lam, on traditional instruments, such as the electric pin (Isaan banjo) and the khaen (Isaan reed pipe).

It's those Isaan sounds that mostly come through, thanks to ever-present transistor radios in market stalls, taxi-cab stereos, masked street performers and, eventually, the Northeastern legends themselves.

Here are the performers:

• Wiboon Tangyernyong – A Khao San-area optician who developed a worldwide following as a maker of bamboo saxophones.
• Sweet Nuj – Young musician and indie record label entrepreneur Bun Suwannochin formed a duo with his singer mother-in-law Worranuj Kanakakorn, and they sell their discs online.
• Happy Band – Following the tradition of The Who, Velvet Underground and Talking Heads, some Bangkok artists thought it'd be a swell idea to create a rock band as an art project. Eventually, they learned to be musicians.
• Captain Prasert Keawpukdee – A gentleman who sells used violins and Buddha amulets at Chatuchak market, he hosts old-timey fiddle jam sessions on weekends.
• Nattapol Seangsukon – Otherwise known as DJ Maftsai, he is a DJ who collects old mor lam, luk thung, string and Thai funk, and is the glue that holds this all together.
• Chaweewan Phanthu – National Artist singer and academic.
• Chalardnoi Songserm – National Artist singer.
• Thongsai Thabthanon – Phin master. "Borrowed" telephone wire from American GIs to string up his Isaan banjo and play with rock bands.
• Sombat Simlhar – A blind virtuoso of the khaen, the Isaan bamboo reed pipe. He lost his sight in early childhood and turned to music, becoming a major recording artist and performer who is still much sought-after.

Critical reception is pretty great. Y/our Music screens at 6.45 nightly until July 22 at the Lido in Siam Square. Rated G

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Also opening

Magic Mike XXL – Before he blew up big with such movies as 21 Jump Street, Foxcatcher and White House Down, dancer and actor Channing Tatum worked for about eight months as a stripper, and it was his early-career exploits that inspired the 2012 sleeper hit Magic Mike, which was directed by Steven Soderbergh and was widely acclaimed. So of course there's a sequel, with Tatum's Mike rounding up most of the six-pack-rocking crew from the first film, including Matt Bomer, Joe Manganiello, Kevin Nash, Adam Rodriguez and Gabriel Iglesias. The story is set three years later, after Mike bowed out of the stripper life at the top of his game. They get back together for a last hurrah, hitting the road for a tour from Florida to South Carolina. Elizabeth Banks, Donald Glover, Amber Heard, Andie MacDowell, Jada Pinkett Smith and Michael Strahan join the cast this time around. Gregory Jacobs, a first assistant director and producer on many of Soderbergh's films, takes over as director. Critical reception is mixed, leaning to positive, making XXL not as well received as the first Magic Mike but probably still magical enough for the fans. Rated 15+

Minions – The gibberish-spewing little yellow characters from Illumination Entertainment's animated Despicable Me franchise come front and center in their own movie, with a story that explains their origins, in which the devoted henchmen quested for centuries to find a master to serve. Their latest is female supervillain Scarlett Overkill (Sandra Bullock), who tasks them with breaking into the Tower of London to steal the queen's jewels. If you listen closely, you might hear a bit of Bahasa Indonesian sprinkled throughout the nonsensical utterings of the Minions. That's thanks to co-director Pierre Coffin, the son of a French diplomat dad and an Indonesian novelist mum. The overstuffed voice cast also includes Jon Hamm, Michael Keaton, Allison Janney, Steve Coogan, Geoffrey Rush and Jennifer Saunders. Critical reception is generally positive. Rated G

Danny Collins – Al Pacino stars in this fact-based musical drama about an ageing 1970s rock musician who is inspired to change his hard-living ways after he receives a letter of encouragement from John Lennon, delivered 40 years late. Nine of Lennon's songs were licensed for the film, which is very loosely based on the life of English folksinger Steve Tilston. Annette Bening, Jennifer Garner, Bobby Cannavale and Christopher Plummer also star. It's written and directed by Dan Fogelman, screenwriter on such films as Last Vegas and The Guilt Trip. Critical reception is generally positive. Rated 18+

F. Hilaire (ฟ.ฮีแลร์) – The writer of the widely used "Darun Suksa" Thai-language textbook was not Thai at all: he was a French Roman Catholic missionary and schoolteacher. Brother Hilaire was one of the key educators behind Thailand's Assumption College and taught many of the statesmen who would lead the Kingdom into the modern era. His story is recalled with help from a present-day scholar (Pharunyoo "Tac" Rojanawuttitham) who is looking for a new angle as he tries to write a thesis. Jason Young portrays the bearded clergyman teacher. Rated 13+

The Scar International Version – Dramatist ML Bhandevanop "Mom Noi" Devakula's adaptation of the classic tragic romance Plae Kao (แผลเก่า) is back in cinemas for one week as The Scar International Version. Adding 40 minutes of further exposition, the longer director's cut premiered at last month's Thai Film Festival in London. Adapted from a novel by Mai Muengderm, The Scar is set in the Bang Kapi countryside of the 1930s, where poor farm boy Kwan is hopelessly in love with Riam, the daughter of a wealthier farming family. The star-crossed romance has been adapted for film and TV many times before, including a beloved 1977 film version by Cherd Songsri. Mom Noi's take stars Chaiyapol Julian Pupart from Mom Noi's Jan Dara remake as Kwan and Davika Hoorne from Pee Mak Phra Khanong as Riam. It's playing at House on RCA.

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Also showing

The Friese-Greene Club – A black-clad gunfighter rides the Old West in search of enlightenment in tonight's cult-classic "midnight movie" El Topo by avant-gard auteur Alejandro Jodorowsky. Tomorrow's "precocious girl" is Natalie Portman, making her motion-picture debut as a pint-sized assassin in Léon: The Professional, starring Jean Reno and a very shouty Gary Oldman. Saturday night's "bad kids" movie is Kinji Fukasaku's Battle Royale, which has inspired such films as Kill Bill and The Hunger Games. Sunday has another imaginary friend in the deeply unsettling Donnie Darko. And next Wednesday, it's South Park: Bigger, Longer and Uncut, in which all the world's ills are blamed on Canada. Shows are at 8pm. The FGC is down an alley next to the under-renovation Queen's Park Imperial Hotel on Sukhumvit Soi 22. For more details, check the club's Facebook page.

European Union Film Festival – The long-running annual EU fest gets underway tomorrow night at SF World Cinema at CentralWorld with Girlhood, a French coming-of-age drama about a black 16-year-old who joins an all-female street gang. Saturday has the Czech sports drama Fair Play and the German post-World War II thriller Phoenix. Sunday has entries from Luxembourg (the Oscar-winning animated short Mr. Hublot and the death-row tale Dead Man Talking). Other entries are the Swedish documentary Trespassing Bergman, the Danish psychological drama The Hour of the Lynx and the Finnish crime yarn Concrete Night. Tickets are 120 baht at the box office. You can also book through the SF app and the website. For showtimes and other details, please check my earlier post.

According to Marguerite Duras Project – Born in French-colonial-era Saigon in 1914, author Marguerite Duras wrote steamy novels that reflected on her affairs and the expat experience. Her works have been adapted many times for films that highlight her cross-cultural romances. She also directed many films herself and wrote screenplays. This month, Thong Lor Art Space is screening some of those movies as part of the According to Marguerite Duras Project. With screenings at 7.30pm on Tuesdays and Wednesdays, next week's show is 1975's India Song. Delphine Seyrig stars as a twice-married French socialite in Calcutta, where she takes lovers to relieve the boredom. Other offerings will be 1969's Détruire dit-elle on July 21 and 22 and 1959's Hiroshima Mon Amour, directed by Alain Resnais, on July 28 and 29. All will have English and Thai subtitles. In addition to the films, which are free, the project is also staging a play. An Epilogue to the Malady of Death will be performed at 7.30pm on Thursday and Friday and 3pm on Saturday and Sunday until August 1. For details, check the Thong Lor Art Space Facebook page or the Facebook events page.

Foreign Correspondents Club of Thailand – Burmese human-rights activist Aung Myo Min is profiled in the documentary This Kind of Love, screening next Wednesday. Directed by Jeanne Hallacy, it premiered at last month's Human Rights Human Dignity International Film Festival in Yangon. The 45-minute doc follows Aung Myo Min's return to Burma after 24 years in exile, and highlights his vision of human rights for everyone, especially GLBT folk. You can read more about the film and Aung Myo Min in stories from The Nation. Hallacy will take part in a panel talk, with Aung Myo Min calling in on Skype. Entry for non-members is 350 baht. The show is at 7pm on Wednesday, July 15 at the FCCT.

Alliance Française – A poor theater actor who has left his wife to take up with his new love – a struggling actress – tries to make that relationship work in La jalousie, directed by Philippe Garrel, and starring Louis Garrel, Anna Mouglalis and Rebecca Convenant. It screens at 7pm on Wednesday, July 15, at the Alliance.

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Take note

Upcoming is the next entry in the Cinema Diverse: Director's Choice series at the Bangkok Art and Culture Center, on July 25, where Concrete Clouds director Lee Chatametikool picks How to Disappear Completely, an award-winning 2013 drama by Raya Martin, one of the leading directors of the Philippines indie film scene. Martin and actress Ness Roque are expected to take part.

Ongoing events include the Short Film Marathon, in which all 500 or so entries in next month's 19th Short Film and Video Festival are screened until August 2. Shows are from 11am to 8.30pm on Saturday and Sunday and 4.30pm to 8.30 Tuesday to Friday in the FA Cinematheque on the second floor of the BACC.

Also, if you still haven't seen the Documentary Club's latest offering The Wolfpack, it looks likely it will be around for another week or so. A weekend screening I attended was more than half full, and more showtimes were being added.  For details, check their Facebook page or SF Cinema City for details.

Bangkok Cinema Scene special: The 2nd Silent Film Festival in Thailand, June 10-17, 2015

A welcome new addition to Bangkok's cavalcade of annual speciality movie extravaganzas, the Thai Film Archive's Silent Film Festival in Thailand is back at the Lido and Scala cinemas for a second year, with rare screenings of classics from the 1910s and '20s, among them the influential German horror The Cabinet of Dr. Caligari, Buster Keaton's stunt-filled Steamboat Bill Jr., more early Hitchcock and a newly rediscovered Sherlock Holmes, all accompanied live by experienced silent-film pianists.

Running from June 10 to 17, here is the line-up:

• The Cabinet of Dr. Caligari (Germany/1920/76 min.) – German Expressionist cinema reaches its most darkly twisted heights in director Robert Wiene's thriller, in which a hypnotist who runs a carnival sideshow keeps a sleepwalking man in a coffin, and can make the somnambulist do his bidding, including murder. Roger Ebert argued that it was "the first true horror film".
• Sherlock Holmes (US/1916/116 min.) – Thought to have been lost, this American film was discovered last year in mislabled cans in the Cinematheque Francaise's collection. It was screened in the recently wrapped-up San Francisco Silent Film Festival, which is supporting the Bangkok fest. Made by Chicago's Essanay Studios, it stars William Gillette, who was well-known for his stage portrayal of Holmes, and his largely credited for the popular image of the sleuth in his double-billed deerstalker cap.
• The Half-Breed and The Good Bad Man (US/1916/101 min) – Here's a double bill of rootin', tootin' westerns starring the great Douglas Fairbanks Sr. and directed by Hollywood pioneer Allen Dwan. The Good Bad Man is another find from the San Francisco silent fest, which last year presented a newly restored version of a 1923 re-release.
• Once Upon a Time (Denmark/1922/75 min.) – Danish film great Carl Theodor Dreyer directs this fairy tale about a wilful princess who is tricked by a prince posing as a pauper. About a third of the film has gone missing, but a recently reconstructed version fills in the blanks with still photos and explanatory intertitles.
• Blackmail (UK/1929/84 min.) – Last year's inaugural edition of the Silent Film Festival in Thailand offered the bulk of the surviving silent films of Alfred Hitchcock. Blackmail, a thriller about a Scotland Yard detective and his girlfriend mixed up in an extortion plot, was Hitch's first "talkie", however it was originally a silent film, and it's that version from the British Film Institute that's screening here.
• Man with a Movie Camera (Russia /1929/68 min.) – The alpha and omega of experimental film, Dziga Vertov's pioneering feature introduced dozens of techniques, such as double exposure, fast motion, slow motion, freeze frames, jump cuts, extreme close-ups and stop-motion animation, which are now part of everyday films, TV, music videos and commercials.
• Piccadilly (UK/1929/108 min.) – The heartstopping beauty Anna Mae Wong, Hollywood's first Chinese-American star, takes the lead in this drama, as a waitress-turned-dancer at at nightclub who becomes romantically entangled with the club owner and causes a rival dancer to be jealous.
• Steamboat Bill Jr. (US/1928/69 min.) – One of Buster Keaton's classic comedies, Steamboat Bill Jr. includes one of the deadpan star's most iconic stunts, in which the facade of a building falls down on him, but he escapes thanks to a window. Keaton portrays a young ukulele-strumming hipster who wants to prove himself as a worthy successor to his father, a big burly riverboat captain.
• The Epic of Everest (UK/1924/ 85 min.) – The official record of the ill-fated 1924 Everest expedition by British climbers George Mallory and Andrew Irvine was made in brutally harsh conditions with a hand-cranked camera. A recent restoration by the British Film Institute reintroduces original coloured tints and tones, including a dramatic blood red sunset over the Himalayas. This will be screened only once at the Scala in a charity gala event that will benefit earthquake relief in Nepal. Tickets are 200 baht.





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Accompanists will be Australia-based Italian classical pianist Mauro Colombis, who has played for the Pordenone Silent Film Festival, the world's biggest silent film fest, and Britain's Stephen Horne, who also has played for screenings in Pordenone as well as Telluride, San Francisco, Cannes, Bologna and Berlin.

They will be joined by noted Thai music lecturer and musical-theater director Dr. Anothai Nitibhon. She will conduct a masterclass for registered participants, who will accompany one round of Man with a Movie Camera.

All films will have English and Thai intertitles. Tickets are 120 baht and available now at the Lido box office. There is also a "Silent Combo" package that has vouchers for eight tickets (closing film excluded) and entitles you to a tote bag from the festival's information table.

For more details, check the festival's Facebook page.

Bangkok Cinema Scene: Movies opening September 25-October 1, 2014

Fin Sugoi

Showing her arty side on Bangkok big screens in the indie drama Concrete Clouds released last week, actress "Saipan" Apinya Sakuljaroensuk goes commercial in Fin Sugoi (ฟินสุโค่ย), heading the cast of young Thai heartthrobs in this release by Sahamongkol Film International.

In the romantic comedy, directed the popular indie helmer "Golf" Tanwarin Sukkhapisit, Saipan is a groupie of a Japanese idol rocker (Makota Koshinaka), and over the objections of her jealous judo-practicing boyfriend (Tao Settapong), she keeps trying to get close to the singer, with help from her friends Moo Ham (Tina Suppanart) and Kai Tong (Guy Nawapol). Rated 15+

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Also opening

God Help the Girl – Born out of an album by Stuart Murdoch of the Scottish indie-pop group Belle and Sebastian, this musical follows a girl who escapes from a mental facility and heads to Glasgow in hopes of making it big in the city's music scene. Emily Browning, Olly Alexander, Hannah Murray and Pierre Boulanger star. A hit at Sundance this year, critical reception is generally positive. Rated G

Premature – The time-loop absurdities of Groundhog Day meets the teen-sex raunch of American Pie in this coming-of-age comedy about a high-school kid who has to relive the loss of his virginity over and over again until he gets it right. John Karna, Craig Roberts, Katie Findlay and Alan Tudyk star. Directed by Dan Beers, the indie comedy premiered at the South by Southwest Festival. Critical reception is mixed. Rated 15+

A Walk Among the Tombstones – Liam Neeson brings his particular set of skills to an adaptation of a 1992 crime novel by Lawrence Block. The Taken and Non-Stop star is a private investigator, recovering alcoholic and former New York City cop who reluctantly takes a case from a heroin trafficker to find the man's wife's killer. Critical reception is mixed. Rated 18+

The Purge: Anarchy – A new batch of hapless ordinary citizens struggle to survive the annual night of mayhem and lawlessness. Frank Grillo heads the cast as a vigilante former lawman who comes to the rescue of a kidnapped waitress and her daughter. Meanwhile, a couple who survives a carjacking try to hitch a ride. Critical reception is mixed, leaning to favorable. This opened in sneak previews last week and now moves to a wide release. Rated 18+

Viy – Jason Flemying (Snatch, Lock, Stock and Two Smoking Barrels) stars in this Russian-made supernatural thriller, which is loosely based on a story by Nikolai Gogol. Flemyng is a cartographer mapping out the wilderness of Eastern Europe who gets lost and turns up in a Transylvanian town that is beset by demons. It's at SF cinemas. Rated 13+

Mystic Blade – Bangkok's merry band of hard-working foreigner stuntmen teamed up to make this martial-arts thriller. Don Ferguson stars as a former member of the Shadow Syndicate, a group of hitmen. Having turned his back on his old ways, fallen in love and started a family, he finds he can't escape his past. He forges a supernaturally endowed blade and sets off on a path of vengeance. Conan Stevens, Jawed El Berni, Tim Man and Julaluck Ismalone also star along with David "Mad Dog" Ismalone, who also directs. For more, check out the trailer. It's at Major Cineplex, and unfortunately, it is apparently Thai-dubbed only. Rated 15+

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Also showing

The Friese-Greene Club – Tonight, family dysfunction freezes over in Ang Lee's The Ice Storm. Tomorrow, British writer-director Chris Morris skewers jihadists in Four Lions, a comedy about bumbling suicide bombers. Saturday's "so bad it's good" entry is 1959's A Bucket of Blood, which set the template for infamous low-budget producer-director Roger Corman. And Sunday's tribute is Lauren Bacall is How to Marry a Millionaire, also starring Marilyn Monroe and Clark Gable. Shows are at 8pm. The FGC is down an alley next to the Queen's Park Imperial Hotel on Sukhumvit Soi 22. There's just nine seats, so book them. Also, check the Facebook page for updates and program changes.

Wildtype Masterclass 001: Fuck Alligator – Chulayarnnon Siriphol is a perennial award winner at the Thai Short Film and Video Festival, where his films, usually satiric views on Thai society, are a highlight. They include documentaries, spoof documentaries and experimental films. This Saturday, Filmvirus and the Reading Room offer a chance to see a bunch of them all at once. The selection goes back as far as 2005 with Golden Sand House, and includes his 2008 winning student film Danger (Director's Cut), 2011's award winners Mrs. Nuan Who Can Recall Her Past Lives and A Brief History of Memory and this year's award-winner Myth of Modernity. There are two programs, at 1 and 3.30pm, followed at 6 by a masterclass and talk by Chulayarnnon. The venue is the Reading Room, a fourth-floor walk-up gallery on Silom Soi 19, opposite Silom Center.

Foreign Correspondents Club of Thailand – The Contemporary World Film Series heads to Denmark for The Hunt. The critically acclaimed drama stars Mads Mikkelsen, winner of the Cannes Best Actor Award for his portrayal of a former schoolteacher who has been forced to start over after a tough divorce and the loss of his job. Just as things start to go his way, an untruthful rumor throws his life into disarray. Thomas Vinterberg directs. Screening, at 7pm on Monday, is presented by the Embassy of Denmark, which will serve Carlsberg beer and Danish snacks. Admission for non-members is 150 baht and 100 baht for the food and drink.

Alliance Française – Classic French films are on offer in October with the theme of "eternal thrillers". The series kicks off with 1963's Les tontons flingueurs, in which a dying mobster makes a deathbed plea to former cohort (Lino Ventura) to look after his soon-to-be-married daughter. It's in French with English subtitles at 7pm on Wednesday, October 1.

Bangkok Cinema Scene: Movies opening May 29-June 4, 2014

The Legend of King Naresuan Part V

Seven years after it first made its bow, director MC Chatrichalerm Yukol's lavishly mounted Naresuan epic rumbles to a close with The Legend of King Naresuan Part V: The Great Elephant Battle (ตำนานสมเด็จนเรศวรมหาราช ๕: ยุทธหัตถี, Tamnan Somdej Phra Naresuan Maharaj Ha: Yuthahatthi). It culminates in the 1593 Great Battle of Yuthahatthi, one of the last major battles to use war elephants.

Wanchana Sawasdee, a lieutenant colonel and cavalryman in the Royal Thai Army, stars as Prince Naresuan. Crowned king of Ayutthaya, the former Black Prince faces a challenge from his childhood friend, the wickedly sneering Burmese viceroy prince Phra Maha Upparacha (Napassakorn Mit-em).

Other stars include "Peter" Nopachai Jayanama as Naresuan's long-time friend Lord Ratchamanu, Inthira Charoenpura as a Karen warrior princess and "Aff" Taksaorn Techanarong as Narusuan's long-time sweetheart Maneechan.

There's also Colonel Winthai "Seh Tod" Suwaree of the Royal Thai Army. He was recently the only thing on Thai TV when the military took over, and served long hours as the spokesman, appearing at odd hours to read a new order from the junta. He plays Ekathotsarot, younger brother of Naresuan and eventual successor to the throne.

Coming three years after Naresuan 3 and Naresuan 4, part five faced production delays when a fire destroyed that very footage the whole franchise had been working up to – the elephant battle – forcing the veteran director to remake it. Funding to shoot that elephant battle had initially come from the Culture Ministry's Strong Thailand fund back in 2010 – originally meant to be 100 million baht – half the film-funding initiative's budget – but cut to around 46 million baht after other filmmakers protested.

It's rated G

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Also opening

The Raid 2: Berandal – Indonesia's martial-arts action franchise barrels on, sending rookie policeman Ram (Iko Uwais) on an undercover assignment in prison, where he's tasked with infiltrating a Jakarta crime syndicate. Director Gareth Evans sequelizes the sequel, adding car chases, more fights and more sinister characters – look out for assassins Hammer Girl and Baseball Bat Man. It was a huge hit at Sundance and critical reception  is mostly positive. Action fans have been practically hyperventilating over it. It's at Major Cineplex only, and looks like it's Thai-dubbed with English subtitles. Rated 18+

Le Week-End – Jim Broadbent and Lindsay Duncan star as a long-married English couple who revisit Paris for the first time since their honeymoon in hopes of rekindling romance. Jeff Goldblum also stars, playing an egotistical American professor living in Paris. Roger Michell (Hyde Park on Hudson, Notting Hill) directs. A nominee for five British Independent Film Awards, and winner of the best actress prize for Duncan, critical reception is mostly positive – perhaps a pleasant diversion for gentle souls seeking something other than a Thai historical battle epic or an Indonesian martial-arts film. It's Apex Siam Square, House, Paragon and CentralWorld. Rated 13+

Island of Lemurs: Madagascar
– Morgan Freeman narrates this short live-action documentary. Nothing to do with the DreamWorks animated series, this chronicles the efforts of a scientist as she works to protect the unique and highly evolved primate species that only lives on the island off Africa. Running just under 40 minutes, it's in 3D at IMAX. Rated G

Heropanti – It's star-crossed romance for two young lovers – a girl named Dimpy who has a strict and stern father, and a guy named Bablu who fights for her love. Kriti Sanon and Tiger Shroff star, making their film debut. It's in Hindi with English and Thai subtitles at Major Cineplex Sukhumvit, Rama III and Pattaya. Opens Friday.

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Also showing

Movies on Design – The film program of the Bangkok Design Festival wraps up today with two entries, Marina Abramovic: The Artist is Present, about the artist who staged an "interactive performance" in 2010 at New York's Museum of Modern Art at 4.15pm and From Nothing, Something: A Documentary on the Creative Process at 6.30pm, followed by a talk. Tickets are 180 baht. More details at the fest's Facebook page.

European Union Film Festival – Evening shows for the fest at SF World Cinema at CentralWorld were shifted to around a half hour earlier in keeping with the old 10am-5am curfew. Hopefully they won't change the times again now that curfew isn't until midnight. Here's the remaining line-up through June 5:

• Russian Dolls – The second of French director Cedric Klapisch's trilogy of breezy romantic comedies that started with The Spanish Apartment, Russian Dolls catches up with Xavier (Romain Duris) and his old cohorts from Barcelona five years later. Lucy Gordon, Kelly Reilly, Audrey Tautou and Cécile De France also star. 6.30 tonight.
• Chinese Puzzle – The newest and final entry in Cedric Klapisch's rom-com trilogy follows Frenchman Xavier (Romain Duris) to New York where he's still trying to figure things out as he visits old friends. Take note: This will get a limited commercial release in Bangkok on June 19. 6.30pm tomorrow.
• A Royal Affair –  Alicia Vikander and Mads Mikkelsen star in this costume-drama account of the relationship between Princess Caroline Matilda and the royal physician to Denmark's mentally ill King Christian VII. 4pm on Saturday.
• Jose and Pilar – Portuguese Nobel Prize-winning author Jose Saramago and his resolute wife Pilar del Rio are profiled in this 2010 documentary. 6.30pm on Saturday.
• The Great Beauty (La Grande Bellezza) – Italian auteur Paolo Sorrentino directs his leading man Toni Servillo through this Fellini-like escapade, following an ageing socialite as he walks through the streets and ruins of Rome following celebrations for his 65th birthday. One of the top films of 2013 of many critics, it won the foreign-language prizes at the Academy Awards, the Golden Globes and the BAFTAs. 4pm on Sunday.
• A Hijacking – The takeover of a cargo vessel by Somali pirates is experienced by crewmembers while back at the ship owner's offices in Copenhagen, a stand-off unfolds as the ransom is negotiated. 6.45pm on Sunday.
• The Symmetry of the Butterfly – From Luxembourg, this multi-layered comedy has a writer living in a retirement home who uses the people around him as inspirations for his stories. 6.30pm on Monday.
• The Gang of Oss – Authorities try to break the influence of criminal gangs on a Netherlands' industrial town in the 1930s. 6.30pm on Tuesday.
• Walking Too Fast – Set in 1982, this Cold War thriller is about a secret police lieutenant who starts to have doubts about his line of work. 6.30pm on Wednesday.
• Finsterworld – Various quirky characters come together in this drama, the first by documentarian Frauke Finsterwalder, that aims to explore the German psyche. 6.30pm next Thursday.

Tickets are handed out 30 minutes before showtime, but the queues start forming before that. Enjoy. All films will be screened in their original languages with English subtitles. Some films will also have Thai subtitles. Check the schedule at SFCinemaCity.com or see www.Facebook.com/EuinThailand.

The Friese-Greene Club – Tonight's final boarding-school story for May is Yuang Zhang's Little Red Flowers, about the struggles of a little boy in regimented post-revolutionary China. Tomorrow night's big-screen feast is Sergio Leone's spaghetti western masterwork, Once Upon a Time in the West. And May closes out on Saturday with the troubled-youth tale Melissa P. It's an erotic drama based on a Sicilian teenager's diary. The club will be hold a private event on Sunday, so keep out. The June schedule kicks off on Wednesday with Red Sorghum, the debut by Chinese film great Zhang Yimou. Other highlights in June include films on democracy (or lack thereof), censorship (or lack thereof), notable films celebrating anniversaries and the club's own first-year anniversary party on June 28, with an encore screening of the first film shown, Blade Runner. Shows are back to 8pm (7 during the old curfew). The FGC is down an alley next to the Queen's Park Imperial Hotel on Sukhumvit Soi 22. With just nine seats, the screening room fills up fast, so reservations aren't a bad idea. For details, check the website and Facebook page.

Bangkok Open Air Cinema Club – A new movie series, set for the last Saturday each month, makes its debut this week at The Hive Rooftop Bar with Star Wars. This is the original 1977 film that started it all. The show's at 7.30pm. Tickets are 300 baht and include a pair of complimentary drinks, beer or prosecco, and unlimited popcorn. Check the website for details on making reservations. The venue is a newly opened five-floor members-only "co-working" space at 46/9 Sukhumvit Soi 49.

Kafka Festival in Bangkok – The embassies of Germany, Austria, Switzerland and the Czech Republic and the Goethe-Institut Thailand are hosting a three-day festival to remember writer Franz Kafka on the 90th anniversary of his death. Events will include lectures, performances and films. The screenings are Michael Haneke's 1997 adaptation of Kafka's Das Schloß (The Castle) at 6pm on June 4 and the 1965 Czech short Postava k podpírání (Joseph Kilian) and the 2006 documentary Who Was Kafka? It's all at the Goethe-Institut off Sathorn Soi 1. Check the website for details.

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Take note

Just hours after last week's update went online here, the Thai military, led by General Prayuth Chan-ocha, upgraded its declaration of martial law (and not a coup) to a full-scale seizure of the government.

A curfew was imposed, running from 10pm to 5am, but that was relaxed starting yesterday, so now we're under lockdown from only midnight to 4am.

Though Taylor Swift has canceled her sold-out concert here – uselessly announced on the very day the curfew was relaxed – most film events, including the EU Film Fest, have soldiered on with only a few minor changes in their schedules.

However, one exception was the Foreign Correspondents' Club of Thailand's planned screening of Michael Winterbottom's Trishna last Monday. It will be rescheduled.

Free film screenings aren't happening in June at the Alliance Française, but that doesn't have anything to do with the curfew or the government situation – it's because there's the annual French cultural fest La Fête, from June 4 to July 6 at various venues.

Meanwhile, there's yet another film festival coming up, the weirdly named Bangkok International Digital Content and Movie Festival, or BIC.Mov.Fest for short, from July 3 to 6 at Siam Paragon. Backed by the Federation of National Film Associations of Thailand, the Culture Ministry, the Commerce Ministry, the Tourism and Sport Ministry and other concerned agencies, it is being positioned as a successor to the long-defunct and scandal-plagued Bangkok International Film Festival. It will offer workshops, seminars and other events to highlight not just the film industry, but also television, video games, animation, character licensing, software and apps. Expect a red carpet to be rolled out at some point. The film selection will likely include a fixture of the old BKKIFF, the "Thai Panorama" of notable and mainstream Thai films of the past year or so.

Just remember, there's the 12th World Film Festival of Bangkok – a real, honest-to-goodness film festival that keeps the focus on films. It's set for October 17 to 26.