Bangkok Cinema Scene special: Bangkok Gay and Lesbian Film Festival, June 10-19, 2016

Twelve films, many of them award winners, which deal with lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender themes from 10 countries will be shown at the Quartier CineArt during the second edition of the Bangkok Gay and Lesbian Film Festival. It’s organised by Attitude magazine.

With the theme “Love Wins”, the BGLFF opens next Friday with Tomcat, an Austrian drama that earned accolades at this year’s Berlin International Film Festival. The story of an orchestra musician and his boyfriend who live with their pet cat, Tomcat won the Berlinale’s best feature Teddy Award, a prize given by an independent jury to films with LGBT topics.

And the Teddy Award audience prize from this year’s Berlinale, Paris 05:59, is the BGLFF’s closing entry. It follows a young gay couple as they meet in a Paris bathhouse and pursue a relationship into the early morning hours.

In a move to boost the festival’s visibility, organisers have chosen a new venue, shifting from the hidden-away Esplanade Ratchadaphisek to the ritzy Quartier CineArt in the Em Quartier downtown.

“Last year was the first year for the Bangkok Gay and Lesbian Film Festival, and we were really happy with the turn-out. All sorts of people came out to support us and our films,” says organiser Marut “Nume” Prasertsri, a senior writer at Attitude magazine. “This year we’re working hard to increase the visibility of the festival to non-LGBT audiences. The films we’ve picked are all quality, well-made films with a wide appeal. We’re looking forward to sharing them with a broad audience of people, not just LGBT folks.”

Along with the prize-winning opening and closing films, Marut suggests a French entry, the lesbian romance Summertime (La Belle Saison) as one film the “straights” might embrace. Set in 1971, it’s the story of a young woman from the countryside who moves to Paris and is attracted to a strong-willed older feminist, who then follows the girl back to her farm. “Non-LGBT folk will better understand what it means to grow up different and they’ll enjoy the romance scenes,” says Marut.

Several of the films in the BGLFF are from Asia, such as Japan’s A Cappella (Mubansô), which takes place during campus protests in 1969 Sendai. South Korea offers a documentary, Weekends, about a gay men’s choir in Seoul. Directed by Lee Dong-ha, it placed third in the Panorama Audience Awards at Berlinale this year.

Further Asian themes are explored in Spa Night, in which a young Korean-American man struggles to reconcile his obligations to his immigrant family with his life in the underground world of gay hookups at Korean spas in Los Angeles. Spa Night star Joe Seo won the Special Jury Award for Breakthrough Performance at Sundance.

And there’s an award-nominee from India, Loev, about a businessman who heads out of town with an old friend, leaving behind problems with his boyfriend in the city. It was up for prizes at festivals in Jeonju, South Korea, and at the Black Nights of Talliin in Estonia.

The Asean bloc is represented by Miss Bulalacao, a quirky independent comedy about a drag princess who gets pregnant following an alien abduction. He is elevated to the status of a cult leader following rumours of immaculate conception. Directed by Ara Chawdhury, Miss Bulalacao won the festival prize at Manila’s Cinema One Originals Digital Film Festival and best first feature from the Philippines Young Critics Circle.

Latin American flavor comes in two entries, From Afar, from Venezuela and Four Moons from Mexico. Winner of the top-prize Golden Lion at the Venice Film Festival last year, From Afar is about a 50-year-old man who pays for the companionship of young men. A meeting with the teenage leader of a street gang changes their lives forever. Four Moons, which won prizes in Montreal, Monterrey and Barcelona, has four stories of gay desire, love and self-acceptance.

And there are high-profile offerings from the U.S. and Canada, with Nasty Baby, which has Chilean actor-director Sebastian Silva working with Tunde Adebimpe in a story about a gay couple trying to have a baby with the help of a surrogate mum, played by former Saturday Night Live star Kristen Wiig. They have a violent run-in with a thug (Reg E. Cathey from The Wire).

And Closet Monster won the best Canadian feature film award and other prizes at the Toronto festival last year. Directed by Stephen Dunn, it’s the dramatic coming-of-age story of a high-school teen who dreams of being a special-effects makeup artist and finds new inspiration.

The Bangkok Gay and Lesbian Film Festival runs from June 10 to 19 at the Quartier CineArt at the EmQuartier mall. Films will have English and Thai subtitles. For more details, check www.Facebook.com/BGLFF or Attitudethai.com/s/bglff

(Cross-published in The Nation)

Bangkok Cinema Scene: Movies opening April 3-9, 2014

Captain America: The Winter Soldier

Chris Evans returns as Marvel Comics' World War II supersoldier in Captain America: The Winter Soldier.

Two years after aliens nearly destroyed New York City in The Avengers, the good-hearted, upstanding and moral Cap is still struggling to find his place in modern society. He's got a list of things to catch up on  and experience, among them eat Thai food.

But a new threat emerges in the form of the Winter Soldier – a steel-armed killer created by Soviet scientists. Turns out it is Cap's old Army buddy Bucky Barnes (Sebastian Stan). In battling the new villain, Captain America teams up with superspy Natasha Romanoff, a.k.a. the Black Widow (Scarlet Johansson) as well as another superhero member of the Avengers, the Falcon (Anthony Mackie).

Samuel L. Jackson also stars, making his return as the eyepatch-clad S.H.I.E.L.D. director Nick Fury, and Robert Redford is Agent Alexander Pierce. Cobie Smulders also returns as Agent Maria Hill.

Brothers Anthony and Joe Russo, who did Welcome to Collinwood and You, Me and Dupree, but also such TV series as Community and Arrested Development, direct.

Critical and fan reception of this film is crazily positive. They're calling it the greatest Marvel Cinematic Universe movie yet. As with the other films in this series, there will be at least two post-credits bonus scenes and teasers to forthcoming attractions, so awkwardly keep your seat and be patient as all the names of the film crew scroll by. It's in 3D (converted) in some cinemas, including IMAX. Rated G

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Also opening

American Dreams in China – This sprawling Chinese rags-to-riches drama charts the rise of three ambitious friends over the course of 20 years as they build a business empire on teaching English. It's directed by celebrated Hong Kong filmmaker Peter Chan, with cinematography by Christopher Doyle. Huang Xiaoming, Deng Chao, Tong Dawei and Du Juan star. It won best film, best director and best actor for Xiaoming at China's Golden Rooster Awards last year. Critical reception is mixed. It's in Mandarin with English subtitles at Paragon, SF World Cinema at CentralWorld, Esplanade Cineplex Ratchada, Major Ratchayothin and House on RCA. Rated 15+

Tarzan – Edgar Rice Burroughs' Tarzan the Ape Man again comes to the big screen, this time in motion-capture animation from a German studio. Twilight heartthrob Kellan Lutz is Tarzan, the orphan boy raised by apes in the African jungle. With his love interest Jane Porter (Spencer Locke), he faces the mercenary army of the evil CEO who took over the Greystoke family business after Tarzan's parents died in a plane crash. Critical reception is mixed. It's in 3D. Rated G

Main Tera Hero – David Dhawan directs this comedy about a small-town guy who heads off to college in Bangalore and falls for a beautiful but mysterious young woman (Ileana D’cruz) and then is caught up in a conflict with a corrupt cop (Arunoday Singh) and a gangster (Anupam Kher) whose daughter (Nargis Fakhri) is charmed by him. In Hindi with English and Thai subtitles at Major Cineplex Sukhumvit, Rama III and Pattaya. Opens Friday.

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Also showing

The Friese-Greene Club – Thursdays this month are devoted to Anthony Hopkins, featuring his films from before he blew up big with Silence of the Lambs. This week's entry is 1987's Charing Cross Road, a transatlantic romance that also stars Anne Bancroft. Fridays are for the films of actor-director Albert Brooks, starting with 1987's Broadcast News. Clipped, crisp dialogue is on tap every Saturday this month with the films of David Mamet, starting with his 1987 drama House of Games, starring Lindsay Crouse as a woman in over her head when she encounters a clique of colorful conmen. Michael Redgrave is the star of Sunday movies, starting this week with The Importance of Being Earnest from 1952. Wednesdays feature documentaries about obsessive filmmakers, and in line with the upcoming release of Noah, next week's offering is Audience of One, about a Pentecostal preacher who gets a message from God – "Make a movie!" Shows start at 8. 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 are a must. There are sometimes additions and changes in the schedule, so please check the website and Facebook page for updates.

Festival of Luis Buñuel in Mexico – Five films made by Spanish auteur Luis Buñuel during his Mexican period from 1946 to 1965 will be shown at the Thai Film Archive in Salaya, Nakhon Pathom on Saturday and Sunday, April 5 and 6. The event, co-sponsored by the Archive and the Embassy of Mexico, opens at 1pm with the comedy El Gran Calavera (The Great Madcap) from 1949. There will then be a talk in Thai by film expert Wiwat "Filmsick" Lertwiwatwongsa. They'll then show the 1952 comedy Subida al Cielo (Ascent to Heaven, a.k.a. Mexican Bus Ride) from 1952. Sunday opens at 1pm with La Illusion Viaja en Tranvia (Illusion Travels by Streetcar) from 1954. Next is the 1959 religious epic Nazarín, which won the International Prize at the Cannes Film Festival and was Mexico's submission to the Academy Awards. The closer is the 1951 family drama La Hija del Engaño (The Daughter of Deceit). All are in Spanish with English subtitles. For more details, check the film archive website or the Facebook page.

Alliance Française – A delinquent boy run scams on wealthy guests at a Swiss ski resort to support his older sister in the 2012 drama L'enfant d'en haut (Sister). Directed by Ursula Meier, who won the Silver Bear in Berlin for her picture, it stars Léa Seydoux and Kacey Mottet Klein. The show is at 7pm on Wednesday, April 9 at the Alliance Française de Bangkok, at the intersection of Rama IV and Wireless roads, opposite Lumpini Park in the former location of the Suan Lum Night Bazaar.

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Take note

Scala stairs by PJ.

There is an important article at the Southeast Asian Movie Theater Project. If you care a wit about the future of the Scala theater or life in Bangkok itself, please read it.

Apologies to any readers who showed up late to the Foreign Correspondents' Club of Thailand's screening of the Cuban film La Bella del Alhambra on Monday. The FCCT has changed its usual screening time, starting at 7pm rather than 8.

Aside from the Friese-Greene Club, another freeloader movie venue that's been mentioned in the press and social media lately is Jam Cafe, off Sathorn Road in the neighborhood of Surasak BTS station. They show movies on Wednesday nights, but they keep their programming a surprise until almost the last minute. This month's theme is "so bad it's good" and this week's selection turned out to be the truly awful Jean-Claude Van Damme film Street Fighter.

The website for House cinema on RCA seems to have gone belly up, but I assure you the place is still open for business. The best way to keep updated is to "like" their page on Facebook.

The Thai Film Archive follows the excellent programming of Salaya Doc with films by Luis Buñuel this weekend. I haven't regularly covered the Archive's activities for a couple reasons, one that it's a bit far from Bangkok and two because the films aren't often English friendly – they show many great old Thai films, but most don't have subtitles. However, henceforth, if I spot something that might be of interest I will mention it.

The Film Virus Double Bill at Thammasat University is taking a break for Songkran. Whew. Programs will resume there on April 20.

Coming up, the Thailand International Film Destination Festival returns for a second edition, running from April 20 to 29 and showing a bunch of foreign films that were made here. Hopefully, I'll have more details about that soon.

And looking further ahead, there's the Swedish Film Festival from April 24 to 27 at SFX the Emporium.

Bangkok Cinema Scene: Movies opening October 17-22, 2013

Machete Kills

What began as a tongue-in-cheek fake trailer for 2007's Grindhouse double feature of Planet Terror by Robert Rodriguez and Death Proof by Quentin Tarantino has blown up into an over-the-top action-movie franchise.

Machete Kills, the sequel to the 2010 first entry, has ex-convict, perennial bad guy, bartender and slow-moving desert reptile Danny Trejo again in the lead. He's a former Mexican "federale" who was betrayed and left for dead. Now working as an assassin for hire, he's tasked by the president of the United States (Charlie Sheen, credited under his real name Carlos Estévez) to battle baddies across Mexico and take down an eccentric billionaire arms dealer (Mel Gibson) who plans to launch a weapon into space.

Aside from cult icon Trejo, the cast boasts Lady Gaga, Desperado star Antonio Banderas, Damian Bichir, Walton Goggins, Spy Kids' Alexa Vega, William Sadler, Amber Heard, Vanessa Hudgens, Chilean stuntman Marko Zaror and Modern Family vixen Sofia Vergara, sporting a machine-gun-equipped bra as Desdemona. Returnees from the first entry include Michelle Rodriguez, Jessica Alba and Tom Savini.

Critical reception isn't as strong as the first film, but if you're a fan of Rodriguez, Trejo and trashy, ultra-violent B-movies, then you'll probably want to see this. It's at SF Cinemas only. Rated 15+

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Also opening

Vikingdom – Vikings? In Malaysia? Yes. Vikings. In Malaysia. A showcase for the increasingly competitive Malaysian film industry – look out Thailand – the CGI-laden Vikingdom is aimed at the fantasy-film fans who might have liked 300 or Game of Thrones. Dominic Purcell stars as a Norse king leading the human forces against the hammer-wielding red-headed god Thor, played here by none other than seven-foot-tall bad-ass Conan Stevens, who was actually in Games of Thrones as "Ser Gregor, the Mountain". Critical reception is mixed, with praise for the special effects. In 3D. Rated 15+

Escape Plan – Having had a blast making The Expendables together, '80s action heroes Sylvester Stallone and Arnold Schwarzenegger have teamed up again for this prison-break drama. Stallone is the world's top incarceration expert. He specializes in breaking out of prisons. He's given one last job – to escape from "The Tomb", a top-secret, high-tech, maximum security facility. But once inside, he finds he's been betrayed and has no way out. So he's forced into an alliance with the prison's top dog (Schwarzenegger). Journeyman Swedish helmer Mikael Håfström (1408, Shanghai) directs. Vincent D'Onofrio, Amy Ryan, Vinnie Jones and Curtis "50 Cent" Jackson also star, along with Jim Caviezel as the warden. Critical reception, so far, is mixed. Rated 15+

Coffee Please (แก้วนี้หัวใจสั่น, Kaew Nee Hua Jai San) – Romance is brewing in the coffee plantations of northern Thailand where a young coffee aficionado (Akrapan Namat) meets Jane (Wanikar Pudchang), a lady architect who can’t tell the difference between a coffeemaker and a barista. Jenwai Thongdeenok and Pakasit Patarateeranon direct. Rated 15+

Is Am Are: A Reason to Live For – Three directors, among them celebrity Pasaweepit Sornakarapa, are behind this three-segment collection of morality tales. The stories cover a fan club member who writes about her favorite superstar who committed suicide 10 years earlier, a teacher trying to boost his self-esteem and advance his career by having sex with a mute prostitute, and an unemployed guy whose life changes when he bumps into an old man while getting off the bus. This is screening at the Lido in Siam Square, with Q-and-A sessions after some screenings. See Facebook for details. Rated 15+.

Code Name: Jackal – A female assassin (Song Ji-hyo) is hired to kill a pop singer (Kim Jae-joong). Trouble is, she makes her attempt at a hotel in full view of the police who are on the hunt for another killer, the notorious Jackal. In Korean with English and Thai subtitles at SF World Cinema at Central World. There is one show daily from today until October 22. For details, see FacebookCCC.KoreanMovies.

Doraemon the Movie: Nobita's Secret Gadget Museum – A catburglar steals Doraemon's magic bell, and as a result, the blue robot kitty starts acting more and more like a real cat. So his friends Nobita, Shizuka, Suneo and Gian go to the factory where all of Doraemon's gadgets are made. Thai-dubbed only. Rated G

Boss – Akshay Kumar stars in this comedy as criminal kingpin who was disowned in his youth by his schoolteacher father. With his younger brother in conflict with a corrupt cop, the father's only hope is to turn to his estranged older boy and ask for help. Mithun Chakraborty, Shiv Pandit, Aditi Rao Hydari and Ronit Roy also star. It's at Major Cineplex Sukhumvit, Pattaya and Rama III.

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Also showing

Karaoke Girl (สาวคาราโอเกะ, Sao Karaoke) – Documentary and drama blend in the debut feature by U.S.-schooled indie filmmaker Visra Vichet-Vadakan. It's the story of Sa, an exceedingly lovely young woman from the countryside who works in Bangkok as a bar hostess to support the folks back home. You'll get to know her through poetic camera work and contemplative moments, as well as trips from the beach and on the train back home. Bank notes flutter on the breeze and she stars in a karaoke video of her own. This played in Bangkok for a week a couple of weeks ago and now returns for a one-week run at House on RCA.

Spanish Film Festival – Continuing at SF World Cinema at CentralWorld, the festival's offering at 7 tonight is Los Niños Salvajes (The Wild Children), an award-winning drama about three Catalan teenagers caught up in dysfunctional family and school lives. Tomorrow, it's the ripping action drama Grupo 7, about a tough anti-drugs police unit in Seville. There's two movies on Saturday, starting at 5 with
Una Pistola En Cada Mano (A Gun in Each Hand), a hit comedy is about eight men in their 40s, all dealing with various crises in their lives. And at 7 it's the casino-heist yarn, The Pelayos (Winning Streak), starring Daniel Brühl and Lluis Homar. The fest closes at 7 on Sunday with Silencio En La Nieve (The Frozen Silence), a mystery that unfolds during World War II on the Russian Front, where a former Spanish police inspector serving in the German army probes strange deaths.

The Friese-Greene Club – Matthew Broderick is a high-school teacher who runs into conflict with an overachieving girl (Reese Witherspoon) running for student-body president in Alexander Payne's Election. Tomorrow, learn all about wunderkind producer Robert Evans in The Kid Stays in the Picture. On Saturday, it's another John Hughes classic, The Breakfast Club, referred to by some critics as "the Citizen Kane of teen movies". On Sunday, Bette Davis is an expat in Singapore in a 1940 William Wyler mystery, The Letter. Next Wednesday, catch another "precocious" girl in The Lawnmower Man, about a girl who strikes up a friendship with the guy who mows the lawn. Shows start at 8pm. 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 please check the website to make bookings.

The Act of Killing – Directed by Joshua Oppenheimer (with Anonymous and Christine Cynn), this experimental documentary is executive produced by Werner Herzog and Errol Morris and has won scores of awards at festivals all over the world. It's a gripping and much-acclaimed account of the continuing and pervasive legacy of the Indonesian death squads of the 1960s. Critical reception is overwhelmingly positive. It's screening at 2pm on Saturday, October 19 at the Lido in Siam Square. Reservations are a must. For details, please check with the Bangkok Experimental Film Festival.

Innocence – Romance is rekindled for Andreas and Claire, passionate lovers in their youth, who meet 50 years later and attempt to pick up where they left off. Directed by Australian helmer Paul Cox, this much-lauded love story of two septuagenarians had tongues wagging when it was released 13 years ago. It screens at 8pm on Monday, October 21 at the Foreign Correspondents Club of Thailand as part of the Contemporary World Film Series. Admission is 150 baht for non-members and 100 baht for anyone wanting to partake of the wine and cheese laid on by the Australian embassy.

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Take note

For some time now, the Major Cineplex chain, including EGV, Esplanade, Mega, Paradise and Paragon, has required viewers to purchase their own glasses for viewing 3D movies. This is a departure from the usual practice.

For example, I saw a 3D movie recently at an SF Cinema City, and I was handed glasses by an usher that then I handed back after the movie. The ticket price, if I recall correctly, was 200 baht.

Major Cineplex is different. They are selling 3D glasses for 150 to 400 baht, with the price depending on how basic or fancy the glasses are and whether you are a M Generation cardholder, which entitles you to a discount of up to 50 percent. Other than having to bear the inconvenience of remembering to take your own glasses when you go see a 3D movie, that's a one-time cost for you.

And Major is saving money by not having to maintain a stock of 3D glasses that have to be cleaned and repackaged after each show and replaced when they go missing or wear out.

And it seems the savings is being passed on. For example, I went to see a 3D movie at Major Cineplex Sukhumvit on a Monday night, when they have a Monday-Tuesday night promotional price of 100 baht for 2D movies. The 3D movie was just 20 baht more. So a better deal, it appears, than SF cinemas.
                                                                                                                                                                 
Next week, owing to the Chulalongkorn Day holiday on October 23, some movies will be opening a day earlier than usual. One of them will be the much-anticipated Thai martial-arts epic Tom-Yum-Goong 2, starring Tony Jaa. The first 3D effort by Jaa, this might be the one you'll want to buy 3D glasses for.

Bangkok Cinema Scene: Movies opening May 1-8, 2013

Iron Man 3

There's just one wide release this week – Iron Man 3 – and it opens today, two days before it makes its bow in U.S. multiplexes. Today also also happens to be May Day, Thailand's National Labor Day, a public holiday. So the movie chains have a chance at luring idle workers and their comrades in to boost up the box-office takings.

Iron Man 3 has Robert Downey Jr. suiting back up for his fourth full-blown outing as the brash billionaire superhero Tony Stark (not counting his cameo in the teaser at the end of The Incredible Hulk). While suffering post-traumatic stress after seeing New York destroyed and his brush with death in The Avengers, Tony faces a fearsome new foe in the guise of the Mandarin (Ben Kingsley), who rips Stark's world apart.

Don Cheadle (not Terrence Howard) also returns as Tony's good friend Rhodey, and he dons a suit too, with a new red, white and blue paint job as Iron Patriot, formerly known as War Machine. Also returning are Gwyneth Paltrow as Stark's girlfriend and longtime assistant Pepper Potts, Guy Pearce as rival industrialist Aldrich Killian and Jon Favreau, the director of the first two Iron Man movies, as Tony's driver and head of security, Happy Hogan.

Iron Man 3 is a Disney/Marvel co-production with China, a strategy that helps Hollywood skirt China's stringent quota rules that only allow a handful of foreign films to screen there each year. It's already opened in several Asian territories and broken many records.

There's even a "Sweded" Thai trailer.

Shane Black directs. He's the superstar screenwriter of the Lethal Weapon series, The Last Boy Scout and The Long Kiss Goodnight, among other flicks, and he also directed Downey Jr. in Kiss Kiss Bang Bang.

Iron Man is part of the sprawling Avengers franchise, but RDJ has been dropping hints that this may be his last go 'round in the armored suit, wondering in GQ magazine "who many genre movies can I do?" He suffered injuries during the filming of Iron Man 3 and is probably still sore. Co-star Paltrow has said she doesn't think there will be an Iron Man 4. It may all be a play to boost Downey's $50 million paycheck even further.

Meanwhile, Phase Two of the Marvel Cinematic Universe is spinning on, with Thor: The Dark World due out later this year, Captain America: The Winter Soldier next year, Joss Whedon's Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. TV series and eventually The Avengers 2.

As always with these Marvel comic-book flicks, there's a post-credits teaser for another movie in the series, so stick around and take time to appreciate just how many people worked on the film.

Critical reception for Iron Man 3 is highly favorable, much better than the rather dull second entry in the series, with the consensus being that the sense of fun from the first entry has returned. It's in 3D in some cinemas, including IMAX. Rated G.

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Also opening

Shootout at Wadala – This fact-based Bollywood action flick recalls the 1982 fatal police shooting of gangster Manya Surve (John Abraham) by Mumbai police. It was the first of the so-called "encounter killings" in Mumbai. Kangna Ranaut and Anil Kapoor also star. It's in Hindi with English and Thai subtitles Major Cineplex Sukumvit (Ekamai) and Central Rama III. Starts Friday.

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Also showing

Which Way Is the Front Line from Here? The Life and Time of Tim Hetherington – Sebastian Junger directs this documentary on war photographer Tim Hetherington, his friend and co-director of the Oscar-nominated, Sundance-winning Afghanistan war documentary Restrepo. Which Way covers Hetherington's life until his last days in Libya, where he was killed on April 20, 2011. After premiering at this year's Sundance festival, it was broadcast on HBO. The Foreign Correspondents Club of Thailand hosts a special screening of the documentary to benefit RISC (Reporters Instructed In Saving Colleagues). Admission for non-members is 350 baht. The showtime is at 8pm on Thursday, May 2 at the FCCT.

Cautionary Tale – This independent feature made its Bangkok debut last weekend at Jam Cafe, a new venue near Surasak BTS station that has regular movie nights. Produced and directed by Christopher Zawadzki, Cautionary Tale follows a children's TV show host grieving over the death of his daughter. The sad New Yorker comes to Bangkok and is cheered up by a Thai rock musician named Cherry. She inspires him to start making music again. There will be two more screenings of A Cautionary Tale, at 6pm on Sunday, May 5 at the Titanium Ice Bar on Sukhumvit Soi 22 and at 7pm on May 14 on the rooftop of the Hotel Muse on Soi Langsuan. Check the film's Facebook page for more details.

Contemporary Mexican Film Festival – Following the celebration of Mexico's Cinco de Mayo this Sunday, the Mexican Embassy in Bangkok is putting on a film festival. Held in conjunction with the Thai Film Archive in Salaya, Nakhon Pathom, the fest will feature five fairly recent Mexican movies. The screenings will be at the Sri Salaya cinema at 5.30pm every Tuesday from May 7 to June 4. The opening film is El Estudiante (The Student), about a 70-year-old man who enrolls in college and meets colorful new friends. May 14 will feature Amor en Fin (Love on a Weekend), which has three love stories from different social classes over the course of three days. Espiral (Spiral) on May 21 is about the women left behind when their men migrate to the U.S. in search of better-paying jobs. La Mitad del Mundo (The Half of the World) on May 28 is about the sexual awakening of a mentally challenged young man. And the closing film on June 4, Flor de Fango (Mud Flower), is a drama about a medical-school lecturer who falls for his family's late nanny's 14-year-old daughter. All will be shown with English subtitles. As always, the Film Archive has daily screenings of Thai and foreign films and many special events. Please follow the FAPOT Facebook page for updates (mostly in Thai only).

Les femmes du 6ème étage (The Women on the Sixth Floor) – Owing to today's public holiday, there's no movie at the Alliance Française tonight. May's roster of screenings starts at 7.30pm next Wednesday, May 8, with Les femmes du 6ème étage, a 2011 comedy directed by Philippe Le Guay about an uptight stockbroker whose life is changed by a colorful group of Spanish maids who've moved into his apartment building. Other movies this month are Louise Michel on May 15, L’Exercice de l’Etat on May 22 and Baara on May 29.