At 'Home' in Udine

With his latest work “Grean Fictions” opening in Thai cinemas this week, director Chookiat “Matthew” Sakveerakul is heading overseas for the European premiere of the award-winning movie he made last year, “Home”, at the Far East Film Festival in Udine, northern Italy.
He’ll be there for the 15th edition of the annual gathering of the world’s Asian movie buffs, which starts today. Joining him will be his “Home” and “Love of Siam” star, singer-actor Witwisit “Pchy” Hiranyawongkul.
Also heading to Udine will be Nattawut “Baz” Poonpiriya, whose first feature, the psychological thriller “Countdown”, collected many trophies during awards season, thanks to the performance by David Asavanond as an unhinged drug dealer named Jesus. “Countdown” will make its international festival premiere.
Other Thai films making their international premieres will be Kongkiat Khomsiri’s gritty period crime drama “Antapal” (“The Gangster”), the nine-segment indie horror “9-9-81” and veteran director Taweewat Wantha’s “cabin-in-the-woods” slasher-horror “Thongsuk 13” (“Long Weekend”).
The festival also hosts the European leg of the Ties That Bind producers workshop, which will have indie director Pimpaka Towira in the hunt for funds for her new project, “Malaria and Mosquitoes”. She’ll also pitch her film at Ties That Bind’s Asian edition later this year at the Busan International Film Festival.

‘RASHOMON’ REVISITED

“U Mong Pa Mueang”, director ML Bhandevanov “Mom Noi” Devakula’s Lanna Kingdom take on Akira Kurosawa’s “Rashomon”, has been picked up for DVD and Blu-ray in the US under a new title, “At the Gate of the Ghost”. It’s by Magnet Releasing, which in the past has socked it to the US with “Ong-Bak 3” and many other Thai films – mostly action flicks.
Although “U Mong” sticks close to Mom Noi’s dramatic stage adaptation of the “Rashomon” translation by National Artist MR Kukrit Pramoj, the spiffy DVD cover puts an emphasis on the action scenes, featuring Ananda Everingham’s warlord in a sword duel with the bandit (Dom Hetrakul in the Toshiro Mifune role).
One US reviewer who was happy to see something from Thailand that is “neither ghosts nor kickboxing” was Denver-based movie critic Peter Nellhaus, who lived in Chiang Mai in the early to mid-2000s. He’s missed out on a lot of Thai films since moving back to Mile High City.
“‘At the Gate of the Ghost’ might not have the kind of impact that ‘Rashomon’ had when it was released over 60 years ago, but more than many remakes, is worth investigating for the reworking of a now-classic story,” Nellhaus writes on his Coffee, Coffee and More Coffee blog.