Bangkok Cinema Scene: Movies opening June 16-22, 2016

Distance

Three award-winning Asian indie directors – Tan Shijie from Singapore, Xin Yukun from China and Sivaroj Kongsakul from Thailand – each take a crack at directing Taiwanese actor Chen Bo-lin in Distance
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The three-segment drama has the actor in different roles in stories that explore the notion of "distance" and what it means in our societies.

The producer behind this ambitious indie project is Anthony Chen, the Singaporean filmmaker who won much acclaim for his 2013 drama Ilo Ilo. He's helped out by Thai producer Aditya Assarat, who also wrote one of the segments.

Distance previously was the opening entry in the Golden Horse Film Festival in Taipei.

It's in Chinese with English and Thai subtitles at SF World Cinema CentralWorld, SFX Cinema Central Rama 9 and SFX Cinema Maya Chiang Mai. Rated 15+

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Also opening

The Nice Guys – Ryan Gosling and Russell Crowe team up for this buddy comedy that is a throwback to a bygone era of Hollywood comedies. Set in 1970s Los Angeles, the neo-noir story has a down-on-his-luck private eye (Gosling) getting help from a self-employed enforcer (Crowe) in investigating the mysterious death of a porn star. Shane Black, the cult-figure screenwriter of Lethal Weapon, co-wrote the script and directs. Critics love it. Rated 15+

Central Intelligence – And Thai movie distributors and cinema chains double down on buddy comedies, with this one starring Dwayne "The Rock" Johnson and Kevin Hart. Johnson is a former fat kid who was bullied in school. He grew up musclebound and became a CIA agent. He attends his high-school reunion while claiming to be on secret mission. He and a motor-mouthed classmate (Hart) get up to adventures while they foil a terror plot. The director is Rawson Michael Thurber, who previously helmed the comedy masterpiece Dodgeball as well as We're the Millers. Critical reception is just starting. Rated G

Finding Dory – After more than a decade of enduring the endless pestering of talk-show host and comedian Ellen DeGeneres to make a sequel to 2003's Finding Nemo, animators at Disney-Pixar finally gave up and made Ellen a movie featuring her forgetful blue tang fish Dory. She starts to have flashbacks to her family, and enlists her clownfish friends Marlin and Nemo to help her. She's then captured and taken to a marine research facility, where she has to make new friends to help her in her quest. Albert Brooks is back as the voice of Marlin with other voice talent including Ed O'Neill, Idris Elba, Dominic West and many others. Critics have all drunk the Pixar Kool-Aid. It's in 3D in some cinemas, including IMAX. Rated G

Udta Punjab – Four characters – a rock star, a migrant labourer, a doctor and a cop – fight the menace of drugs. Shahid Kapoor, Kareena Kapoor, Alia Bhatt and Diljit Dosanjh star. In Hindi with English and Thai subtitles at Major Cineplex Sukhumvit, Rama III and Pattaya. Opens Friday.

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Also showing

The Third Silent Film Festival in Thailand – One of the earliest vampire films, 1922's Nosferatu opens the festival at 8 tonight at the Scala. Live musical accompaniment will be by German composer and multi-instrumentalist Gunter A. Buchwald, with percussion by Thai classical musician Anant Nark-kong. Tickets are 200 baht. The fest then shifts over to the Lido for screenings from Friday until Wednesday. Tickets are 120 baht. They are all great films and are worth seeing on the big screen with live musical accompaniment – it is an experience that can only be had in the cinema. The line-up was profiled in a special post last week. For further details, check check www.Fapot.org or www.Facebook.com/silentfilmthailand.

Singapore Film Festival – The third annual Bangkok showcase of Singaporean cinema gets underway today at SF World Cinema at CentralWorld. Running until Sunday, the fest have five entries, ranging from 1997's 12 Storeys to last year's SG50 celebration 7 Letters. It was all covered in a special post last week. Tickets are free and will be handed out 30 minutes before the shows. For more details, check the SF cinemas' site.

Bangkok Gay and Lesbian Film Festival – The second edition of the BGLFF continues until Sunday at the Quartier CineArt. Lots of worthwhile stuff. The line-up and schedule were detailed in a recent special post. Tickets are 160 baht and 180 baht. Please note that there are no ads before the shows, so the films are generally starting on time, at least that was the case when I attended last weekend.

The Friese-Greene Club – American politics are still in focus tonight with Recount, an award-winning 2008 HBO drama about the 2000 presidential ballot recount in Florida. Kevin Spacey, Laura Dern, John Hurt and Denis Leary are among the stars. Tomorrow, it's Wong Kar-wai's drama of unrequited romance In the Mood for Love, which had Bangkok locations standing in for 1960s Hong Kong. And Saturday has a "not-so-classic" foreign film made in Thailand, Sacrifice!, a 1972 Italian cannibal horror that's also known as The Man from Deep River. And Sunday's film from 75 years ago is the Josef von Sternberg thriller The Shanghai Gesture. Next Wednesday is a documentary on U.S. politics, 1960's Primary, which recalls the Democratic nomination fight between JFK and Hubert Humphrey. 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 – Tomorrow night's French film with Thai subtitles is Il était une forêt (Once Upon a Forest), a documentary by Luc Jacquet, who later did March of the Penguins. Next Wednesday's French film with English subtitles is Alda et Maria (All Is Well), in which a pair of teenage girls escape civil war in the Congo and land in Lisbon. Shows are at 7pm. Admission for the general public is 100 baht.

Foreign Correspondents Club of Thailand – The Contemporary World Film Series has one more movie this month, with Le meraviglie (The Wonders) at 7pm on Monday. An Italian-Swiss drama, it's about a family of beekeepers in the Tuscan countryside who have their quiet lives disrupted by the arrival of a troubled teenage boy and by a reality-TV crew. Directed by Alice Rohrwacher, it won the Grand Prize of the Jury at the Cannes Film Festival in 2014. Admission is 150 baht for non-members plus 100 baht for anyone wanting the wine and cheese laid on by the Swiss Embassy.

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Take note

House cinema is still closed for renovations. The place was to reopen today, but work is taking a bit longer than expected, now lasting until June 22.

The European Union Film Festival kicks off next week at CentralWorld, running June 22 to July 3.

And the oddball Thailand International Film Destination Festival has finally got around to simply stating when it will take place. Drumroll please: July 4 to 13 at Paragon Cineplex.

Bangkok Cinema Scene: Movies opening December 3-9, 2015

Wolf Totem

Banned from China after 1997's Seven Years in Tibet, French director Jean-Jacques Annaud was welcomed back into the country to make Wolf Totem, an epic historical drama about a young man from Beijing who bonds with a wolf cub when he is assigned to teach nomads in Inner Mongolia during the Cultural Revolution in 1967.

It's a fact-based adventure epic, based on an autobiography by Lu Jiamin, about a young man caught between the advancing forces of modernising China, the traditional ways of Mongolian nomads and the wolves of the wilderness.

The project took many years to plan and complete, and involved the raising and training of a wolf pack, specifically for the movie. Working with animals is something of a trademark for Annaud, who previously made The Bear as well as Two Brothers, which was filmed in Thailand and involved tiger cubs.

Initially tipped as China's entry to next year's Academy Awards (China ended up submitting the Chinese production Go Away Mr. Tumor), the French-Chinese produced Wolf Totem screened in China during the Lunar New Year holiday. Critical reception is mostly praiseworthy. It's at Apex in Siam Square.

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Also opening

Runpee (รุ่นพี่, a.k.a. Senior) – Writer-director Wisit Sasanatieng returns to the scene with a boarding-school horror romance for the M-Thirtynine studio, It's about a schoolgirl (Ploychompoo Jannine Weigel) who has a special gift for smelling out ghosts. This leads her to meet a mysterious senior ghost boy and to investigate a murder that happened at the school 50 years before. It's the first feature in five years from Wisit, one of the important writer-directors of the New Thai Cinema movement of the late 1990s and early 2000s, and whose films include two of that era's classics, Tears of the Black Tiger and Citizen Dog. Rated 15+

Khun Thong Daeng: The Inspirations (คุณทองแดง The Inspirations) – In celebration of His Majesty the King's 88th birthday this Saturday, here is an animated feature with stories that are inspired by His Majesty's favorite pet dog Khun Thong Daeng. Produced by music-festival promoter Vinij Lertratanachai, with concepts overseen by movie-marketing strategist Dr Head, The Inspirations has three stories about pooches from three animation studios. Imagimax Studios has Mah Wad (Mid-Road), about a tough injured stray who is adopted by an elderly monk, and unites the temple's dog pack to protect the place from thieves. The Monk Studio contributes Tong Lor, which deals with the relationship between a blind girl, her grandmother and their pet dog. And Workpoint Studios is still in the world of robots, similar to the company's animated feature Yak a few years ago, with Little Copper, about a boy robot who gives new life to his robot pet. The three tales are tied together by live-action segments involving a girl who wanted her uncle (comedian "Nong" Choosak Iamsook) to buy her a foreign pure-breed dog, and he instead came up with a Thai mutt, played by the talented four-legged actor Richard, who has been the canine star of many Thai movies, TV shows and commercials. There is more about the movie in an article in The Nation. Rated G

Suffragette – Women are beaten and thrown into jail for demanding the right to vote in this historical drama, which covers the fight for suffrage in England in the early 20th century. Carey Mulligan stars as a young laundry worker who is swept up in a suffragettes' protest and is eventually inspired to take up the cause. Helena Bonham-Carter plays an activist who befriends Mulligan's character. Meryl Streep also stars, portraying the historical figure Emmeline Pankhurst, leader of the women's suffrage movement. Sarah Gavron (Brick Lane, Village at the End of the World) directs. Critical reception is generally positive. Expect to be hearing more about Suffragette as awards season gets underway. Rated 13+

In the Heart of the Sea – Director Ron Howard is hunting Oscars in this fact-based high-seas adventure drama about the wreck of the whaling ship Essex, which was smashed to bits by a huge sperm whale, leaving the crew marooned. Chris Hemsworth stars as First Mate Owen Chase, whose book about the ordeal is said to have inspired Herman Melville to write Moby-Dick. Others in the male-focused cast are Benjamin Walker, Cillian Murphy, Tom Holland, Brendan Gleeson (he's also in Suffragette) and Ben Whishaw. Critical reception is just starting to spout. Rated G

Krampus – Frustrated with his family's bickering during the festive season, a boy somehow summons the demonic spirit of Krampus, the Satan-like being from European Christmas lore who accompanies St. Nicholas and punishes children who are bad. This is a horror-comedy, with Adam Scott, Allison Tolman, David Koechner and Toni Collette among the stars. It's directed by Michael Dougherty, who previously wrote and directed the Halloween comedy Trick 'r Treat. Critical reception was unknown as this was being written, but it could be another holiday classic. Rated 13+

Baby Steps – Two dads are in focus in this Taiwanese-U.S. family comedy-drama about an Asian-American man and his Caucasian boyfriend seeking to have a child together. While Danny and his partner Tate deal with finding a surrogate mom, Danny's overbearing mother (veteran Taiwanese actress Kuei Ya-Lei) takes control of the proceedings. Barney Cheng writes, directs and stars as Danny. Among the producers is Hsu Li-kong, whose past credits include many Ang Lee movies, including Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon, Eat Drink Man Woman and The Wedding Banquet, which Baby Steps pays tribute to. Rated 15+

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Also showing

The Friese-Greene Club – "Cool Britannia" on Wednesdays, "Woody Allen's favorite films" on Thursdays, "Not Such a Wonderful Life" on Fridays, restored classics on Saturdays and "Christmas cheer" on Sundays are the themes for December. Tonight, it's The Bicycle Thieves, which Allen said was "the supreme Italian film and one of the greatest films in the world". Tomorrow's anti-wonderful entry is the pardon-my-French film Baise-moi while Saturday has James Dean in Rebel Without a Cause. Sunday's bit of Christmas cheer is 1951's Scrooge, the classic adaptation of Charles Dickens' A Christmas Carol, starring Alistair Sim as the greatest humbug of them all. And next Wednesday's British film is Underground, covering a night in the life of a teenage drug dealer. From 1998, it's the first feature from FGC proprietor Paul Spurrier. And yes, it's cool. 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.

Two films by Lav Diaz – Filmvirus, the group of Thai cinephiles and academics, have a special event this holiday weekend, bringing in more films by Filipino auteur Lav Diaz, thanks to generous support from the Japan Foundation. They are his Locarno prize winner From What Is Before, showing on Sunday at House, and the Typhoon Yolanda documentary Storm Children, screening on Monday at the Chinatown art space Cloud. The screenings were announced late last week by the Filmvirus crew and spaces went fast. Monday's event, which includes a talk by Diaz himself, is full, but the Sunday film screening still has a few spaces left. Check the Facebook post for details.

German Open Air Cinema – The aristocratic von Lengefeld sisters are both in love with the firebrand writer-philosopher Friedrich Schiller in Beloved Sisters, a sweeping historical drama that won German Film Awards for costumes and makeup. The show is at 7.30pm on Tuesday, December 8, outdoors at the Goethe-Institut on Sathorn Soi 1.

Alliance Française – With his previous missing-persons case ending in tragedy, a nearly retired police inspector takes one last case, to track down details about a mysterious mute man who was discovered unconscious on a French beach with no identification. It's La Dune, a 2013 comedy-drama. The show is at 7pm on Wednesday, December 9, at the Alliance.

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Take note

Along with Khun Thong Daeng: The Inspirations, there is another film in honor of His Majesty the King's birthday, Keeta Maha Raja Niphon (คีตราชนิพนธ์), which was first released this past May. It has four well-made segments that are in part inspired by musical compositions of His Majesty. Among the stories is the dramatic biographical account of the late conservationist Seub Nakhasathien. It's directed by Parkpoom Wongpoom and stars Nopachai “Peter” Jayanama. Well-known directors of other segments include Nonzee Nimibutr and Yongyoot Thongkongtoon. Keeta Maha Raja Niphon is screening until Monday (a substitution public holiday) at Major Cineplexes, where free tickets are first-come, first-serve and are handed out at special table an hour before the shows.

Bangkok Cinema Scene special: Salaya Doc 2015

With an abiding focus on Southeast Asia, as well as filmmaking and cultural preservation, the Salaya International Documentary Film Festival returns for its fifth edition from March 21 to 28 at the Thai Film Archive in Salaya, Nakhon Pathom, and from March 24 to 27 at the Bangkok Art and Culture Centre.

Opening film

• The Look of Silence – Director Joshua Oppenheimer continues to examine genocide in Indonesia with this follow-up to his Oscar-nominated The Act of Killing, which rounded up the lethal men behind Indonesia’s anti-communist purges of the 1960s. The Look of Silence centers on an optometrist who uncovers the identity of the men who killed his brother. Winner of the Venice fest’s grand jury prize and awards at many other festivals, The Look of Silence has been much acclaimed, and has even been made required viewing for Indonesian military troops.

Closing film

• Y/Our Music – Unusual figures at the fringes of Thailand’s music scene are featured in this indie doc by Waraluck “Art” Hiransrettawat Every and David Reeve. It journeys through the Isaan countryside and hidden pockets of Bangkok to survey an array of musicians, from the amateur maker of bamboo saxophones to veteran performers of traditional songs. The documentary premiered at last year’s Busan fest, and this week makes its North American premiere at the music-leaning South by Southwest Festival in Austin, Texas.

Special screenings

• Southeast Asian Cinema – When the Rooster Crows – Italian director Leonardo Cinieri Lombroso interviews four of the region's cinema talents: Cannes-winning best director Brillante Mendoza from the Philippines, Singapore’s Eric Khoo, Indonesia’s Garin Nugroho and Thai auteur Pen-ek Ratanaruang. It is generously sprinkled with clips from all the directors’ films, and has interviews with producers, critics and behind-the-scenes talents. I reviewed it at last year's Luang Prabang Film Festival.
• Flowers of Taipei: Taiwan New Cinema – Here's a look at the influential stalwarts of Taiwanese cinema, among them Edward Yang and Hou Hsiao-hsien, and how they aided Taiwan’s transformation from a hub of cheap plastics manufacturing to a cultural and technological powerhouse. Artists and filmmakers from other parts of the world are interviewed about how Taiwanese cinema has shaped their work. They include Thai director Apichatpong Weerasethakul invoking his “film is memory” mantra, along with Kiyoshi Kurosawa, Hirokazu Kore-eda, Jia Zhangke, Wang Bing, Ai Weiwei and others.
• Love is All: 100 Years of Love and Courtship – Rare footage from the British Film Institute and Yorkshire Film Archive covers this history of romance in film, from the very first kisses ever caught on film, through the disruption of war, to the birth of youth culture, gay liberation and free love. It's directed by Kim Longinotto directs, and Richard Hawley, formerly of the British rock band Pulp, provides the soundtrack.
• No Word for Worry – Norwegian director Runar Jarle Wiik looks at the fast-fading culture of Moken “sea gypsies” in Myanmar, and one young man's efforts to preserve it.
• The Wages of Resistance: Narita Stories – This is a followup to the series of classic documentaries by Ogawa Shinsuke about the farmers who opposed the building of Tokyo's Narita airport in the 1960s. They haven't given up, and are now fighting airport expansion. It's directed by Daishima Haruhiko with Otsu Koshiro, who served as cinematographer on Shinsuke's earlier docs, which I saw at the 2011 edition of Salaya Doc.
• National Gallery – And the festival continues to fete the esteemed 85-year-old “institutional” documentarian Frederick Wiseman. Last year the festival featured his At Berkeley and this year it's an exhaustive three-hour look behind the scenes of the revered London art museum.

Asean competition

• The Storm Makers – Cambodian filmmaker Rithy Panh, whose Oscar-nominated The Missing Picture screened in Salaya last year, produces this work by French-Cambodian director Guillaume Suon. It's the story of Aya, a young woman who at age 16 was sold into work as a maid in Malaysia, where she was exploited and beaten for two years without receiving any pay. “I should have died over there”, she says. The director then has a chat with Pou Houy, the notorious head of a recruiting agency who shamelessly admits he doesn’t care what happens to the women he hires, and that he’s only interested in profit.
• Die Before Blossom – Indonesian director Ariani Djalal focuses on two families during a decisive period of their daughters’ schooling in Yogyakarta, just as public education in Indonesia is coming under political pressure to include more Islamic teachings in its formerly secular curriculum.
• Lady of the Lake – Yangon Film School student Zaw Naing Oo directs this examination of Myanmar’s “cult of the nat” – spirit worship – in a village on Moe Yun Gyi Lake, in the country’s southcentral Bago Region.
• Echoes from the Hill – In northern Thailand, a village inhabited by the “Pgaz K’Nyau” – simple humans – is under threat. Their sacred belief is to remain in harmony with nature, even as they come into conflict with the Thai government’s attempts to build a dam and make their ancestral forest lands a national park. Jirudtikal Prasonchoom and Pasit Tandaechanurat, students King Mongkut’s Institute of Technology Ladkrabang direct.
• Madam Phung’s Last Journey – Ageing drag queens lead a transgender carnival troupe around Vietnam. At each town, a pattern is repeated. Locals are at first enchanted by the entertaining visitors, but later at night, after the drinks have flowed, the scene turns ugly, and the troupe has to beat a hasty retreat. Nguyen Thi Tham, who spent around a year embedded with the troupe, directs. I reviewed it at last year's Luang Prabang Film Festival.
• 03-Flats – Lei Yuan Bin seeks to dispel the dull and drab image of Singapore's public housing program with help from three single women who have made their flats into spaces that can truly be called homes.

Please note that the screening schedule had not yet been completed when I last checked, and that this is only a tentative lineup. I'll aim to have further information in time for my usual update next Thursday. For more details, check www.Fapot.org or www.Facebook.com/SalayaDoc.

Bangkok Cinema Scene: Movies opening January 8-14, 2015

Foxcatcher

One of the season's most-buzzed-about awards contenders, Foxcatcher is based on true events that I don't remember. And I want the story to be a surprise, so I'm avoiding reading too much else about it.

So here's what I've gathered by only halfway researching about the film. Channing Tatum stars as Olympic wrestler Mark Schultz, who despite winning a gold medal, has always been overshadowed by his more-beloved brother Dave (Mark Ruffalo). But Schultz sees a way to greater glory when he and his brother are invited by eccentric millionaire John du Pont to move onto his large estate and train for the 1988 Olympics.

Both Mark Schultz and the creepy du Pont are desperate men, and their drive to achieve pushes them into a spiral of self-destruction.

Bennett Miller (Capote, Moneyball) directs. Already, Foxcatcher has a number of accolades, including the best director prize from Cannes and three Golden Globe nominations – best picture, best actor for Carell and best supporting actor for Ruffalo.

Critical reception is generally positive. Rated 18+

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Also opening

Taken 3 – Liam Neeson again brings his particular set of skills to the franchise that relaunched his career as an action star. In this third and possibly final entry, his ex-wife (Famke Janssen) is killed and he's framed for murder. While eluding the authorities and protecting his daughter (Maggie Grace), he must track down the real killers. Forest Whitaker also stars. Olivier Megaton (Taken 2, Colombiana) directs the script by producer Luc Besson and Robert Mark Kamen. Critical reception is mixed. Rated 13+

Hector and the Search for Happiness – Simon Pegg is a quirky psychiatrist who is tired of his humdrum life. So he embarks on a global quest to uncover the secret to true happiness. Rosamund Pike also stars. Peter Chelsom (Hannah Montana the Movie, Shall We Dance) directs. Critical reception for this piece of schmaltz is mixed. If you're a fan of Pegg's work in such movies as Shaun of the Dead or Hot Fuzz, go watch those again. Rated 13+

Black and White: The Dawn of Justice – This is the second entry in a big-budget Taiwanese police-action franchise. Mark Chao stars as Hero Wu, a dutiful police detective. He's paired up with arrogant loner cop Chen Zhen (Kenny Lin) to track down the mastermind behind a series of bombings. They discover the attacks are just a prelude to a bigger scheme involving stolen missiles and biochemical weapons. Thai-dubbed. Rated 13+

Beauty and the Beast – Vincent Cassel and Léa Seydoux star in this live-action adaptation of the French fairy tale about a young woman who falls in love with a beastly-looking man. It's in release for one week only from tomorrow at the Apex cinemas in Siam Square.

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Also showing

Frozen Sing-Along – Follow the bouncing snowflake and see if you can match the high notes of "Let It Go" with the sing-along version of Disney's Oscar-winning animated hit. More than a year on, Frozen remains crazily popular, thanks mostly to the hit song "Let It Go", which is not only a favorite with karaoke fans, but is also so insanely loved by children, that director Jennifer Lee has apologized to parents who are fed up with hearing it. The Frozen Sing-along runs in cinemas for just one week. Rated G

The Friese-Greene Club – Spanish filmmakers, "strange futures", Doris Day and documentaries help get 2015 underway at the Club. Thursdays are devoted to Spanish directors, opening with Abre Los Ojos by Alejandro Amenabar, which was remade as Vanilla Sky. "But the original is so much better," seems to be the consensus. Documentaries are featured on Wednesdays and Fridays. Tomorrow, it's 2012's The Imposter, about a man who returns his family after disappearing years before. "Strange futures" are on Saturdays, opening with the influential Silent Running, director Douglas Trumbull's 1972 sci-fi classic, starring Bruce Dern as the last man alive aboard a massive spaceship. Sundays are all about Doris Day. This week it's Pillow Talk. Next Wednesday's documentary is 2009's Cropsey, which examines the New York urban legend of a child-killing monster and segues into the story of Andre Rand, a convicted child kidnapper. Shows are at 8pm. The FGC is down an alley next to the Queen's Park Imperial Hotel on Sukhumvit Soi 22.  For more details, check the club's Facebook page. There's just nine seats, so book them.

The Circle – SF Cinema's "Doc Holiday" series continues with The Circle, a fact-based Swiss drama about the relationship between schoolteacher Ernst Ostertage and drag queen Robi Rapp, chronicling their efforts as members of the Circle, a pioneering gay-rights group that battled homophobia in the 1950s. It's Switzerland's entry for the best foreign language film at this year's Academy Awards. It screens in German with English and Thai subtitles at 9pm from tomorrow until Sunday and at 5pm on Saturday and Sunday at SF World Cinema at CentralWorld. For details, check the SF Cinemas website.

Filmvirus Kawaii Luv Luv – Filmvirus starts 2015 with a series of Sunday double features of youth-oriented Japanese romances, running until February 8. First up is 2013's See You Tomorrow, Everyone by Yoshihiro Nakamura, followed  by 2012's The Drudgery Train by Nobuhiro Yamashita. The show starts at 12.30 on Sunday in the Pridi Banomyong Library at Thammasat University Tha Prachan, in the Rewat Buddhinan Room, floor U2. Dress appropriately and inform the desk worker you are there to see a movie. For details, call (02) 613-3529 or (02) 613-3530.

German Open Air Cinema – It's star-crossed romance in The Silent Mountain, when war breaks out in the Dolomites just as an Italian woman and an Austrian man hope to form their own European union. William Moseley, Eugenia Costantini and Claudia Cardinale star. It screens at 7.30pm on Tuesday, January 13, at the Goethe-Institut off Sathorn Soi 1.

Alliance Française – A bitter and depressed woman falls into an alcoholic coma and awakens 25 years in the past, giving her a second chance at life in Camille Redouble, written, directed by and starring Noémie Lvovsky. Will she make the same choices that led her to an unhappy marriage? It's in French with English subtitles at 7pm on Wednesday, December 14 at the Alliance.

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Take note

In addition to the Polish Film Festival from January 18 to 22 at SF World cinema at Central World, another upcoming event is the Japanese Film Festival from January 30 to February 8 at Paragon. And Filmvirus and and Wathann Film Festival join for a screening of old and new Myanmar films on January 24 and 25 at the Reading Room.

Bangkok Cinema Scene: Movies opening March 6-12, 2014

Mr. Peabody and Sherman

Adapted from the archly satirical and lovably goofy Rocky and Bullwinkle cartoons made by Jay Ward in the 1950s and '60s, Mr. Peabody and Sherman is a feature-length treatment of a segment called Peabody's Improbable History, in which an urbane bespectacled talking dog masterminds time-travel adventures with his trusty adopted human boy, the awkward geek Sherman.

The story involves the bullied Sherman misusing Peabody's vaunted WABAC machine to impress his classmate Penny, and it is up to them to restore the space-time continuum. Mr. Peabody's time-travel adventures usually involved him encountering historical figures. Here, the characters include Sigmund Freud (Mel Brooks), Leonardo da Vinci (Stanley Tucci), King Agamemnon (Patrick Warburton) and Mona Lisa (Lake Bell).

Ty Burrell (Modern Family) is Peabody and kid actor Max Charles is Sherman. Other voice actors include Stephen Tobolowsky, Allison Janney, Dennis Haysbert, Stephen Colbert and Leslie Mann.

It's directed by Rob Minkoff, the animation vet who helmed The Lion King. Craig Wright wrote the screenplay. His credits include the decidedly adult TV shows Six Feet Under and the short-lived 2007 series Dirty Sexy Money, which he created. It's produced by Dreamworks Animation.

Although Rocky and Bullwinkle only ran during the height of the Cold War from 1959 to '64, it aired in syndication during my childhood. I suppose somewhere out there, Moose and Squirrel are still cracking kids up with their sophisticated satire and sideways-glancing puns. The animation may have been a bit on a crude side, but the writing was top-notch.

Previous adaptations from the Jay Ward franchise have not fared well. The live-action-animation Adventures of Rocky and Bullwinkle from 2000 (with Robert DeNiro as the evil Fearless Leader) wasn't that good. And the live-action Dudley Do-Right from 1999 fell flat off his horse. But Mr. Peabody and Sherman seems like it is actually pretty good – surprisingly. It opened in sneak previews last week and now moves to a wide release. It's in 3D (actual) in some cinemas. Rated G

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300: Rise of an Empire

Australian action star Sullivan Stapleton is the lead warrior in 300: Rise of an Empire, a sequel to the cult-hit swords-and-sandals CGI epic 300.

But he likely won't be promoting the movie because of a serious head injury he sustained when he fell off a tuk-tuk a few weeks back while in Bangkok on a break from filming the Cinemax military-action series Strike Back. Not much else is known about the incident, which happened while Stapleton was "exploring the town in his free time". The series' production is on a six-month hiatus, likely delaying its premiere for a few months or even until next year. According to film-industry sources, they shot around his remaining scenes in Thailand and are now on a break before resuming production in Hungary.

Anyway, 300: Rise of an Empire is based on 300 graphic novelist Frank Miller's unpublished Xerxes. It deals with what was going on with another band of scrappy Greek warriors while 300 Spartans were fighting and dying at Thermopylae. Stapleton is Themistocles, an Athenian general leading the Greeks in ab-crunching exercises. Eva Green is the the fierce warrior queen Artemisia and Brazilian actor Rodrigo Santoro is the imposing and much-pierced King Xerxes of Persia. Game of Thrones' Lena Headey is the Spartan queen.

Noam Murro (Smart People) takes over as director from 300 helmer Zack Snyder, who is at work on his Man of Steel sequel. But the comic-book fan Snyder still has a hand in, producing and co-writing the script.

Critical reception is mixed, leaning to favorable. It's in 3D (converted) in some cinemas, including IMAX. Rated 15+

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Also opening

Will You Still Love Me Tomorrow? – This award-nominated romantic comedy from Taiwanese director Arvin Chen stars Richie Ren and Mavis Fan as a couple with one kid who've been married for nine years. With the wife putting pressure on her hubby because she wants another child, complications arise when an old friend of the husband turns up and turns out to be gay. It premiered at last year's Berlin International Film Festival and was in competition at New York's Tribeca fest. Fan is a supporting-actress nominee for the upcoming Asian Film Awards. Critical reception is leaning to favorable. It's at House, Paragon, Esplanade Ratchada and SFW CentralWorld. Rated 15+

Gulaab Gang – An all-female movie is a rarity from any film industry, especially Bollywood, but that's what we have here with Gulaab Gang, which stars Madhuri Dixit as a woman who sets up a sanctuary for her abused and battered sisters. Armed with axes and sickles, these vigilantes in pink saris mete out justice while grinding spices and weaving baskets. Juhi Chawla, Divya Jagdale, Priyanka Bose and Tannishtha Chatterjee also star. It's in Hindi with English and Thai subtitles at Paragon and Major Cineplex Sukhumvit, Rama III and Pattaya. Opens Friday.

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Also showing

The Friese-Greene Club – Philip Seymour Hoffman is a skeevy schoolteacher in love with his teenage student in 25th Hour, Spike Lee's post-9/11 commentary of New York, as seen through the eyes of a drug dealer (Edward Norton) who is on his way to prison and is spending one last night out with his pals. It screens tonight. Tomorrow is the Soviet war drama Come and See. From 1985, Elem Klimov's film deals with the Nazi occupation of Byelorussia during World War II. On Saturday, it's 1975's One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest, which is only the second film to win all five major Academy Awards. Sunday is the flag-waving musical by Michael Curtiz, Yankee Doodle Dandy, with Jimmy Cagney as the irrepressible Broadway showman George M. Cohan. 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 changes in the schedule, so please check the website and Facebook page before planning a visit.

Singapore Film Festival – Nostalgia for the 1990s is being stoked this weekend in the Singapore Film Festival at SFX the Emporium. Two films are being screened, That Girl in Pinafore and Ilo Ilo. Up first at 7 on Friday is That Girl in Pinafore by Chai Yee Wei. Set in 1992 – the year the island republic banned chewing gum – four young pranksters enter a music contest while they chase girls. It also screens at 4 on Saturday. Showing at 7 on Saturday and Sunday, Ilo Ilo is the first Singaporean entry to win a prize at the prestigious Cannes Film Festival, the Camera d’Or for debuting director Anthony Chen. It’s the heartfelt story of a Filipina maid (Angeli Bayani) who goes to work for a middle-class Singaporean family. She struggles to bond with the family’s bratty boy and please the domineering pregnant matriarch (Yeo Yann Yann) while the father has been thrown out of work, but is keeping that a secret. Tickets are free and can be collected 30 minutes before the screening.

Film Virus Double Bill – Two titans of Filipino cinema, Lino Brocka and Ishmael Bernal are featured this Sunday. Up first is Brocka's All Be Damned (Hahamakin lahat) from 1990. A social drama involving betrayal and revenge, it follows lower and upper-class couples in conflict. Bernal's Working Girls from 1984 is a contemporary urban satire. It was recently remade. The show starts at 12.30pm on Sunday. The venue is the Rewat Buddinan Room in the basement of the Pridi Banomyong Library at Thammasat University, Tha Chan. You'll need to show your I.D. and have it copied to gain entry. The best way to get there is to take the Chao Phraya River Express to Wang Lang (Siriraj) pier and then ride the ferry across to Tha Chan.

German Film Series – The Goethe-Institut Thailand's monthly film series offers the 2011 drama If Not Us, Who? at 3pm on Tuesday, March 11 at the Bangkok Art and Culture Center. There is another screening at 3pm on Sunday at the Thai Film Archive in Salaya. It covers a tumultuous time of change in Germany, from the post-war late 1940s through the '60s, culminating in the German student protests of 1968. August Diehl stars and Andres Veiel directs. The film premiered in competition at the 61st Berlin International Film Festival and won the Alfred Bauer Prize and the Prize of the Guild of German Art House Cinemas.

German Film Weekends – Apart from the ongoing monthly German Film Series, there is also the Goethe-Institut Thailand's German Film Weekends from March 15 to 30 at the Esplanade Cineplex Ratchadapisek. The opening gala is actually not on a weekend, it's next Wednesday, March 12, with proceedings starting at 5.30pm, when World Film Festival of Bangkok director Kriengsak "Victor" Silakong will share his experiences from this year’s Berlin International Film Festival. Afterwards they'll show the drama Lessons of a Dream by Sebastian Gobler. It's about an English teacher (Daniel Bruhl) who teaches boys a new game – soccer. Other films will be Westwind on March 15, a package of Oscar-winning and nominated live action and animated shorts in Short and Sweet IV on March 16, Barbara on March 22, Cracks in the Shell on March 23, Hotel Lux on March 29 and 1950's Two Times Lotte on March 30. Shows are at 4pm. Tickets are free and can be reserved by phone at (02) 287-0942-4 ext. 80/82 or by e-mail, programm@bangkok.goethe.org. For more details, please see the Goethe website.

Alliance Française – Cyril Mennegun directs the 2012 drama Louise Wimmer, about a homeless woman who works hard to maintain her dignity. Corinne Masiero, Jérôme Kircher, Anne Benoît and Marie Kremer star. The show starts at 7pm at the Alliance Française de Bangkok. It's 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

All is calm in Siam Square on Tuesday night, as folks head in to the 9 o'clock screening of Pompeii.

Bangkok breathed a collective sigh of relief last Saturday when it was announced by the whistleblowing anti-government protesters that they would end their occupation of major city intersections and set up camp in Lumpini Park. The move came as deadly violence was ramping up around the rally sites and there was even talk of civil war. While joggers in Lumpini are inconvenienced, residents can visit the Pathumwan, Ratchprasong and Asoke areas without fear of having a bead drawn on them by snipers or blown to bits by grenades.

Now that it's safe to roam around, later evening shows have resumed at the Apex chain's Lido and Scala cinemas in Siam Square. They had been curtailed while the rally was in force at Pathumwan.

The end of the Bangkok Shutdown also clears the way for film-lovers to safely take part in an upcoming event, the Salaya International Documentary Film Festival, which runs from March 22 to 29 at the Thai Film Archive in Salaya with a concurrent program from March 25 to 28 at the Bangkok Art and Culture Center. Among highlights will be At Berkeley by the great documentarian Frederick Wiseman and premieres of the award-winning The Songs of Rice and Cambodia's first Foreign Language Film nominee, The Missing Picture. Read more about it at that other blog.

Disney's Frozen is back in cinemas, in celebration of its winning the Oscars for animated feature and original song. The move was perhaps prompted by the viral social-media photo of one of the Thai animators who worked on the film holding the Oscar statuette. Many other Oscar winners and nominees can also be seen on the Bangkok big screen, including 12 Years a Slave, Dallas Buyers Club, Blue Jasmine, Gravity, American Hustle and The Wolf of Wall Street.

Bangkok Cinema Scene special: 11th World Film Festival of Bangkok

Hurtling into its 11th year, the World Film Festival of Bangkok will open with the award-winning Australian-made Lao-Isaan family drama The Rocket and close with a new documentary by indie Thai filmmaker Nontawat Numbenchapol, By the River.

Winner of the Crystal Bear and two other prizes in Berlin, The Rocket is the tale of a little boy who is believed to be the bringer of bad luck after his family loses his home. So, with a colorful cast of characters, including a drunken uncle played by veteran Thai comedian Thep Po-ngam, he sets out on an adventure to change his fortune.

Directed by Kim Mordaunt, The Rocket won the Audience Award and prizes for Best Narrative Feature and Best Actor for young star Sitthiphon Disamoe at the Tribeca fest. It's also picked up audience awards at home in Melbourne and Sydney. And Australia has submitted it to next year's Academy Awards for Best Foreign Language Film.

The closing film By the River (สายน้ำติดเชื้อ, Sai Nam Tid Shoer) is an award-winner too, earning a special mention after its premiere in Locarno. It chronicles the 15-year legal struggle that ensued after a lead mine contaminated Kanchanaburi province's Klity Creek and ruined the livelihoods of villagers.

With more than 800 films submitted, the fest boasts a decent selection of Thai indie features this year.

A highlight will be The Isthmus by Sopawan Boonnimitra and Peerachai Kerdsint. The story of a little Thai girl who starts speaking only Burmese, it premiered last week at the 18th Busan International Film Festival, where it was in the New Currents competition.

Other new Thai indie features are Village of Hope, an ode to rural Thai ways by veteran helmer Boonsong Nakphoo, and Mother, the debut feature of young director Vorakorn Ruetaivanichkul.

There will also be a few Thai indies that have made the rounds already in limited release in Thailand, such as Kongdej Jaturanrasmee's Tang Wong, Visra Vichit-Vadakan's Karaoke Girl and Boundary by Nontawat.

This year's Lotus Award for lifetime achievement goes to Jarunee Suksawat, one of Thailand’s biggest movie stars of the 1970s and '80s. Two of her classic melodramas will be shown, Baan Sai Thong and Pojjamann Sawangwong

Other highlights of the Asian Contemporary section include Stray Dog, which is supposedly the last film Taiwanese auteur Tsai Ming-liang plans to make. Others are A Woman and War by Junichi Inoue, To My Dear Granny by Chu Yu-Ning and Innocents by Singapore's Wong Chen-Hsi, winner of best director in the Asian New Talent Awards at this year's Shanghai fest.

And in the Doc Feast category, a highlight is To Singapore With Love. Another is The Last Shepherd, about the last travelling sheepherder in metropolitan Italy.

Cinema Beat, covering the rest of the world, is where you'll find a bunch of other don't-miss titles such as France's Stranger By the Lake, which won the Un Certain Regard directing prize for Alain Guiraudie at Cannes this year as well as the Queer Palme. There's also Israel's Rock the Casbah, an award-winner in Berlin about an Israeli soldier in 1989, seeking to avenge the death of a fellow soldier.

And an oddball pick is Synecdoche, New York from 2008. The story of a playwright (Philip Seymour Hoffman) who goes crazy while spending his life mounting an immense living theater production, it's the directorial debut of Charlie Kaufman, screenwriter of such weird and wonderful movies as Being John Malkovich and Adaptation.

Other festival sections include Cine Latino, giving rare exposure in Bangkok to films from such places as Brazil, Argentina, Peru, Mexico, Portugal and Spain.

In all, there are 60 films from 25 countries.

The 11th World Film Festival of Bangkok runs from November 15 to 24, and for the first time it will be held at SF World Cinema at CentralWorld.

Look for the complete lineup at the festival website.

Bangkok Cinema Scene: Movies opening March 27-April 3, 2013

Pee Mak Phra Khanong

The often-told legend of the ghost wife Mae Nak Phra Khanong gets an update for teenybopper audiences in Pee Mak Phra Khanong (พี่มาก...พระโขนง), one of the Thai film industry's first big tentpole releases of the year.

Set 100 or so years ago in a small canal village that's now a paved-over part of Bangkok, the story has been adapted into films dozens of times and is probably best known for 1999's Nang Nak by Nonzee Nimibutr and screenwriter Wisit Sasanatieng. Originating as a play that was recounted by word of mouth so many times that it passed into folklore as a "true story" (there's even a shrine to the "actual" Mae Nak in Bangkok's Phra Khanong district), it's about young woman named Nak who dies in childbirth while her husband Mak is away at war. He returns home and resumes living with his wife and baby, unaware that she and his child are ghosts.

In Pee Mak, the apparently dimwitted and besotted husband's blissful ignorance is played for laughs as four hilarious pals make desperate attempts to get him to realize his lovely wife is a fearsome ghost.

Starring heartthrob young actor Mario Maurer as Mak and Davika Horne as Nak, it's released by GTH. The director is Banjong Pisunthanakun, the celebrated young helmer who had a hand in such films as Shutter, Alone, Phobia and Hollywood's recent ABCs of Death horror omnibus. Rated 15+.

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Also opening

Lincoln – The leading nominee of this year's Academy Awards with 11 nods, Steven Spielberg's lavishly mounted historical drama features an Oscar-winning turn by Daniel Day-Lewis, who inhabits the role of the 16th U.S. president during the final months of his life. With the bloody War Between the States still raging and dividing the country, Abraham Lincoln faces an epic fight in Congress to pass the 13th Amendment to the Constitution, putting an end to slavery. Based in part on historian Doris Kearns Goodwin's book Team of Rivals: The Political Genius of Abraham Lincoln, the film also stars Oscar-nominee Sally Field as Lincoln's domineering wife Mary Todd Lincoln and grouchy old Tommy Lee Jones in a much-nominated and SAG Award-winning role as fierce anti-slavery proponent Thaddeus Stevens. I've been looking forward to Lincoln and believe it will make a sober bookend to the insane Django Unchained, which opened here two weeks ago. As a preview, check out comedian Louie CK's version of Lincoln. Critical reception is of course mostly positive. This is in a somewhat limited release, at Apex Siam Square, Paragon, Major Cineplex Ratchayothin, SFW CentralWorld and SFX the Emporium. Rated G.

G.I. Joe: Retaliation – The action movie franchise based on a line of Hasbro toy action figures gets a bit of a reboot in this sequel. Most of the cast from 2009's first entry are gone and have been replaced by the likes of Dwayne "The Rock" Johnson and iconic action hero Bruce Willis. The story has something to do with the evil people from COBRA taking over the White House and unleashing a powerful weapon that turns cities into mush. It also features cool ninjas fighting on the side of a mountain. Jon M. Chu, who's previously directed the Step Up dance movies and the Justin Bieber concert film, makes his first foray into blockbuster action, with the script by Zombieland writers Rhett Reese and Paul Wernick. I thought the first G.I. Joe movie was pretty dumb but also a lot of fun. And, having premiered in a few places already, critical consensus for Retaliation seems to hint at more of the same. Having opened here yesterday, it's in 3D in some cinemas, including IMAX and IMAX Digital. It's in 2D at Apex Siam Square. Rated 13+.

One Day (You yi tian) – This 2010 Taiwanese arthouse sci-fi romance has a young woman working on a ferry boat who has a recurring dream in which a young man shouts something at her that she can't understand. Then, one day, on the ferry boat, she meets a young soldier who says that someday he'll be her boyfriend. The debut fictional feature by Hou Chi-jan, One Day screened at several festivals, including Berlin, Hong Kong and Singapore. Critical reception is positive. It's in Mandarin with English and Thai subtitles at House on RCA.

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Also showing

In Lav We Trust – Two recent works by the master of long-form black-and-white human suffering, Filipino auteur Lav Diaz, screen at the Reading Room on Silom Soi 19 on Saturday and Sunday, March 30 and 31. The films are 2011's Century of Birthing (Siglo ng pagluluwal) and last year's Florentina Hubaldo, CTE. Century of Birthing has two stories, one about a filmmaker who has spent years making an epic and still isn't happy with it, and the other dealing with a religious cult of mainly young women who are dominated by their charismatic male leader. Florentina Hubaldo, CTE is described as a philosophical drama about the psychological effects of injustice and arbitrariness, with two poor laborers leaving the city to look for a treasure. "CTE" is a medical acronym referring to the condition suffered by boxers who get punched in the head too many times. Both films clock in at 6 hours, which as Diaz fans know make them actually short films. The showtime is 1pm. I advise getting there early in order to stake out the spot you'll be occupying for the day. Bring along snacks and perhaps a pillow, folding chair or bedroll.

A still from Boundary, which opens Salaya Doc 2013.

Salaya International Documentary Film Festival – Salaya Doc 2013 gets underway on Monday, April 1 at 5pm at the Film Archive in Nakhon Pathom, with Boundary (ฟ้าต่ำแผ่นดินสูง, Fahtum pandinsoong), Nontawat Numbenchapol's look at the disputed border area around Cambodia's Preah Vihear temple. It premiered at last month's Berlin International Film Festival. The festival runs in Salaya until Sunday, April 7, with many worthwhile and thoughtful special programs and the ASEAN documentary competition. The festival also runs from Tuesday, April 2, to Sunday, April 7, at the Bangkok Art and Culture Center. At BACC, the competition screenings are during most of the week at BACC and with the special programs taking place next weekend. I'll detail them more next week. Or, please see a recent post on that other blog and check the festival's Facebook page for the schedules.

Thailand International Film Destination Festival – This rather hastily planned event that unfortunately conflicts with Salaya Doc runs from April 1 to 10 at SF World Cinema at CentralWorld. Plans are to screen such such made-in-Thailand Hollywood blockbusters as The Hangover Part II, The Beach and The Lady as well as China's low-budget box-office surprise Lost in Thailand, all of which have screened here before. Local premieres will include Formosa Betrayed, which has Thailand standing in for 1980s Taiwan, the Danish romantic comedy Teddy Bear and Swedish director Lukas Moodysson's globalization drama Mammoth starring Gael García Bernal and Michelle Williams. And, although it's been out on DVD for awhile, the action film Elephant White will make its Thai theatrical premiere. Directed by Prachya Pinkaew (Ong-Bak), it stars Djimon Hounsou as a mercenary holed up in a Buddhist temple while protecting a mysterious woman. He runs into conflict with a former friend, played by an oddly accented Kevin Bacon. The centerpiece of this 80-million-baht festival put on by the Thailand Film Office under the Department of Tourism is the Amazing Thailand Film Challenge, which has 48 foreign and two Thai teams rushing to complete short films and win a grand prize of 1 million baht. The winners will be announced at the obligatory red-carpet closing ceremony on April 10. Please check the festival website for the screening schedule.