Made-in-Thailand 'Rocket' shoots for an Oscar

FILMMAKERS of every tongue would love to lick an Oscar, so there’s an Oscar every year for best foreign-language film. It’s great for countries where they don’t speak English, and Australia – where most people only pretend to speak English – gets in on the action by submitting movies emerging from its cosmopolitan melting pot.
Cate Shortland’s “Lore” was all in German, Tony Ayres’ “The Home Song Stories” was in Chinese along with English, and Warwick Thornton’s “Samson & Delilah” and Rolf de Heer’s “Ten Canoes” offered Something Completely Different by using the Aboriginal languages Warlpiri, Yolngu Matha and Gunwinggu.
Thais have found it much easier to follow this year’s entry, “The Rocket” (“Bang Fai”), shot primarily in Thailand and Laos. Its director, Kim Mordaunt, is Australian, and he’s gad great success with it on the festival circuit, winning the Crystal Bear and the Amnesty International prize in Berlin and a pair of trophies including Audience Choice at New York’s Tribeca festival.
Most of the cast are Thai, including comedian Thep Pho-ngam and the child protagonist, an actual former street waif named Sitthiphon “Ki” Disamoe. You probably remember him giving everyone a real-life fright a few months ago when he went missing for two weeks. (His mother and the movie’s Thai producer eventually found him at an Internet caf