Showing 1 - 4 of 4
Andalusian dreams
Life, Kong Rithdee, Published on 15/02/2024
» Two Middle Eastern tourists looked excited as they held up a phone to an exquisitely carved arabesque in Nasrid Palace at the Alhambra. No, they're not taking photos. They're comparing the Arabic text on their screen with the 8th century stone calligraphy. I hear them mumble in Arabic -- here's the translation:
2023 ROUNDUP A vintage year for Thai cinema?
Life, Kong Rithdee, Published on 25/12/2023
» There were cheers of jubilation and gasps of disbelief as Thai cinema found itself awash with excitement in 2023. This has been the most successful year for mainstream Thai movies in a decade, a box-office triumph far exceeding all expectations. To many, the 2023 coup de theatre calls for celebration. "We are back!" cried optimistic pundits. But also: "Really? Is it just a one-time cinema party and can we keep the ball rolling?"
To dump or not to dump
Life, Kong Rithdee, Published on 31/12/2019
» The title of a new Thai film is a bilingual wordplay: How To Ting is literally translated as "how to dump". That, I think, is sharper than its tired official English title, Happy Old Year. To dump or not to dump -- things and people, mementos and memories -- that is the question. In the film, a young designer who's dressed like a Muji model, and who has just returned from studying in the minimalist-paradise Sweden, plans to dump all useless objects from her maximalist Bangkok house, where she lives with her mother and brother, and to turn it into an all-white, supremely sparse and unapologetically decluttered interior nirvana -- a home office lifted straight from a Scandinavian style book.
The pastoral romance returns
Life, Kong Rithdee, Published on 19/09/2018
» The star-crossed lovers coo. They ride their buffaloes through a verdant field, splash mud, evade spiteful parents, and make a vow at the shrine of the banyan tree. But their romance, like all memorable romances in books and life, is doomed by the circumstances of fate, tragic and scarred, and their destiny is one of the most heartbreaking in the canon of Siamese literature and film.