By Supapohn Kanwerayotin/BANGKOK and HONG KONG
Far Eastern Economic Review, October 4, 2001
The speaker is the Thai film director Nonzee Nimibutr. "The book" is The Story of Jan Dara by Usana Pleungtham, an erotically charged tale of a man's sexual odyssey through life that was first published in 1964.
Nonzee has long been fascinated by the novel: "It's a story about anything at all you come across or experience, but that you don't want to talk about," he says. True to the novel's theme, Jan Dara the movie tests new ground in what Thailand is prepared to show on screen under its arcane censorship laws.
The film is breaking the mould in other ways, too. Jan Dara is the first Thai movie to be wholly financed by foreign money; $2 million from Applause Pictures, which was founded by three Hong Kong film-makers to push Asian films on the world stage.
For Nonzee, a former ad director who has established a strong reputation with films like Nang Nak, working with Applause was very different from the usual Thai way of doing things. "We Thais used to just improvise around with some vague ideas for things," he says. "But for the first time, I had to have a lawyer and a contract, written in English. We also had to account for our spending."
Peter Chan, a partner in Applause and himself a director, believes the international link has brought only benefits. For the first time, he points out, distributors have picked up a mainstream Thai movie after seeing just short trailers, rather than waiting for the finished film.
"The timing is just right for Thai films to capture the attention of the international market," Chan adds. That's a reference to recent successful Thai films like Tears of the Black Tiger which was a surprise hit at Cannes this year, and Iron Ladies, a popular comedy about a transvestite volleyball team fighting social prejudice.
Whether Jan Dara will enjoy similar success remains to be seen. Certainly, the superb cinematography makes Jan Dara a visual triumph. But unlike Nonzee's Nang Nak--a straightforward love story centring on two characters--Jan Dara is much more complex.
It follows the life of a man, Jan Dara, in the early part of this century from his childhood in a Bangkok home ruled over by a satyric aristocrat, through to his own sexual awakening as a teenager and into an adult life where his fate is shaped by incest and lesbianism in his extended family. Non-Thai viewers may find themselves struggling to read subtitles and follow a story that has flashbacks and a multitude of often similar-looking characters, some of whom are played at different ages by a succession of actors.
Among the cast, the tempestuous character of Kaew, Jan's stepsister, is outstanding, particularly as played in her adult version by Pataravarin Timkul. By contrast, the portrayal of Jan (played by, among others, Suwinit Panjamawat--last seen in Tears of the Black Tiger--and Eakarat Sarasukh) appears lightweight.
Perhaps surprisingly, Thailand's censors have pronounced themselves happy with the version of Jan Dara submitted by Nonzee, who has trimmed back some of the more explicit scenes ahead of its Thai release on September 28. Audiences elsewhere in Asia will get to see a "fuller version" in early October.
And the cuts look to have done nothing to dim Thai movie-goers enthusiasm for this much-discussed film: "Oh, what profanity!" said one sarcastic participant on the Thai chat site, pantip.com, after seeing a steamy trailer for Jan Dara. "By the way, when and where can I see the whole thing?"
