Ter yields indie status to praise the lonely freelancer

 He’s the guy who penned “Top Secret”, the “Ruk 7 Pee Dee 7 Hon” (“7 Something”) episode in “14” and the blockbuster “Rod Fai Fah ... Maha Na Ter” (“BTS: Bangkok Traffic Love Story”). The studio’s big producers, Jira Maligool and Wanruedee Pongsittisak, were much pleased. But when it came time for Ter to climb the biggest rung on the ladder and make his debut as a director, he chose the independent route – and did just as well, tuning out “36”, “Mary is Happy, Mary is Happy” and his most recent, the documentary “The Master”.
Now, though, the still-young director has returned to GTH, directing “Freelance Ham Puay Ham La Ham Rak Mor” (“Heart Attack”), due out on September 3 with Sunny Suwanmethanon playing a self-employed entrepreneur who falls for a beautiful doctor (in the lovely shape of Davika Hoorne).
Tying the movie’s release to the studio’s 11th anniversary, Jira says he found Ter’s idea about the “freelancing life” quite appealing. Ter was obviously drawing on personal experience as an independent artist, at a time when more and more young people are striking out on their own, deploying YouTube and other online avenues to avoid having to always work for someone else.
“Ter told me about his life as a freelancer,” says Jira. “At one point he was working so hard that he got sick, so he went to see a doctor and actually did fall in love with her.
“You can really sense Ter’s freelance spirit. He does all his work in coffee shops, so he knows which ones are best for working late into the night, which ones have the best and cheapest coffee and the ones where he can safely leave his belongings on the table while he goes to the restroom.”

Two million eyes watching

Speaking of successful independents, 15-year-old Thai-German singer Jannine “Ploychompoo” Weigel has become Thailand’s first independent music artist to accumulate a million subscribers on YouTube. If you haven’t been there yet, check out her JanninaW channel.
A runner-up on the Channel 3 contest show “Singing Kids”, Ploychompoo was signed with GMM Grammy as a trainee artist and soon made her professional debut in a music video for Getsunova’s “Klai Khae Nai Khue Klai” (“How Far is Near”). By age 12 she had the YouTube channel, steadily adding covers of Thai and foreign hits. To date, 44 of her videos have chalked up more than a million views each.
The million-subscriber breakthrough earns Ploychompoo YouTube’s Gold Button Award. “When I was still a trainee at GMM Grammy and started to release the YouTube clips, I had no big expectations about the number of viewers,” she says. The lesson for any aspiring singer, she says, is to work hard, study hard, be patient and always follow your dreams – because they’re never far away.
Meanwhile, scooping up dreams left and right, Ploy has also done a couple of turns as an actress, appearing in “Om Yim” (“Smiles”), part of the film series “Keeta Maha Raja Niphon”, and in the TV series “Banlung Mek”.
One last plug for the power of that YouTube thing comes from Ariya Banomyong of Google Thailand: “Ploy is an inspiring example of how budding artists can use YouTube as a platform to share their musical talents with the world and build successful brands as mainstream musicians.”
Of course, being able to carry a tune is crucial, don’t forget. Ploy’s got that part nailed.