Adam's zombies hold firm as "Thrones" is attacked by pirates

Before HBO’s producers even knew what hit them, the first four episodes were leaked, posted on torrent-download sites and swallowed whole by a public overanxious for more of the medieval intrigue, fire-spewing dragons and buxom naked ladies. 

Surely the makers of the series saw this coming, and surely they set up safeguards, and yet their protective castle still came tumbling down. Clearly any movie or TV series can be pirated these days, and the pirates could care less if it’s unhealthy for the entertainment industry. 

There was a rumour going around that director MR Chalermchatri “Adam” Yukol’s new movie, “Phi Ha Ayothaya”, is already available for illegal download, almost a month before it’s due in cinemas. But Adam says that’s nonsense. He posted a photo of himself on Facebook and Twitter holding a work-in-progress HDD version of the film in his hand. “How could any website claim it has ‘Phi Ha Ayothaya’ ready for download?” he asks. “The movie isn’t even finished yet and it’s right here on my bedside! Even if this is a free-download business, you lie with a straight face to your fans. Ha, ha, ha.” 

Nor did Adam have to battle with pirates over his earlier film, “Sarawat Ma Baa” (“The Cop”), he says. “I’ve never exported any file in 1080 or 720p format, so anyone who downloaded the film in HD, you were conned!”

Okay, but we’re still wondering who has access to Adam’s “bedside”. Has he been keeping an eye on the maid?

 

He’s now an impresario

Movie buff Thapanan “Ken” Wichitratthakarn can feel thoroughly vindicated for going to so much trouble and expense sharing his favourite flick, the award-winning Brazilian gay romance “The Way He Looks”, with fellow Bangkok cinephiles.

It hung on in the selected theatres for exactly 28 days, which is quite admirable considering that quite a few pictures, including many from Hollywood, expire within three weeks. 

So we say “nice going” for the independent movie distributor in his first try. Driven by passion alone, Ken told Soopsip before the film debuted here that, if he didn’t lose too much money in the attempt, he’d buy the screening rights to another one. 

Now Ken has thanked fans on his Facebook page, Doo Nang Took Wan (Watching Films Every Day), for their support, and especially those who helped push for the movie to be screened.

“Actually it’s kind of fun to buy a movie to show in theatres, even though there are so many headaches. It’s not easy either making money from screening films,” he writes. 

Ken told us, guessing, that he invested maybe more than Bt200,000 getting “The Way He Looks” to Bangkok, but we’re thinking it was probably even more, and he also put a lot of work into translating the Portuguese dialogue and inscribing the Thai subtitles.