Oscar voters get to see how sweet Thais are

THE FEDERATION OF National Film Associations of Thailand has once again turned to studio GTH for something that might grab attention among the select crowd that votes for Oscar nominees. Thailand’s official entry to compete for Best Foreign Language Film at the 87th Academy Awards in February is the sentimental romance “The Teacher’s Diary” (“Kid Tueng Wittaya”).
You’ll recall that the GTH thriller “Countdown” got the nod as Thailand’s nominee last year. Evidently it wasn’t thrilling enough, though, because the Oscar went to some other country.
Released in March, “Teacher’s Diary” was a hit at the box office here at least, in fact the Kingdom’s top movie for two weeks. Director Nithiwat Tharathorn is pretty pleased that Hollywood is going to take a look at it. “I’m so happy – it’s the greatest honour in my life!”
He says he feels like an athlete carrying the flag at the Olympics. But he shares credit with producer Jira Maligool, his team and the cast, especially lead actors Sukrit “Bie” Witsetkaew and Chermarn “Ploy” Boonyasak.
Nithiwat reckons the film will give foreigners a positive look at Thai people, particularly our teachers. If you stubbornly refused to go see it, it’s about the slowly intertwining stories of two lonely teachers (Ploy and Bie), who are assigned to the same rural school, but a year apart.
Having endured a few sacrifices making the movie, Bie echoes Nithiwat’s belief that foreigners will come to appreciate the sacrifices that teachers everywhere make – and get a load of that gorgeous Thai scenery too! “I am honoured and very glad about this good news,” Bie says, and we certainly hope he has a lot more than that to say if it wins the Oscar.

Sek settles down, sort of
We’re guessing the Army sent someone over to Seksan “Sek Loso” Sukpiman’s house to “make him happy”, because he and his wife, Wiphakorn “Karn”, have called off their war of words on Facebook.
If we’re right, the troops evidently didn’t tell him to get off the social networks altogether because he’s still facebooking away like an addict (just an expression). He updates his “status” every hour or so to sate the yearnings of his 1.7 million fans, but his posts are free of the hostility that had turned his page a furious red in recent weeks.
Sek’s posts this week have been more about making money, mainly through his upcoming concert. Yesterday there were pictures of the merchandise that will be sold – T-shirts, caps and other junk – but you can order by phone right now! Some calls must have come in right away because he immediately posted that he needed to contact the merchandise makers and order extra stuff.
Considerably more interesting news came with his announcement that former Miss Universe, former Mrs Tennis Ace Paradorn Srichipan and aspiring singer Natalie Glebova has agreed to record a duet with Sek, the ear-wormy “Way Back into Love” from the movie “Music and Lyrics”.
“We’ll make a music video too, and I’ll upload it when it’s done so you guys can download it,” he writes. (Yes, we know how it works, Sek.) He then uploaded a string of videos of him (though not Natalie) rehearsing the song. Like his wife Karn and everyone else, we’re keen to see what lies between the lines of “Way Back into Love”.