Showing 1 - 7 of 7
Living in Thailand's age of impunity
News, Kong Rithdee, Published on 17/01/2026
» There's no place like Thailand. Joyscrolling TikTok and Reels reveals dozens of clips made by international visitors lamenting having to leave our lovely country and return to dreary Europe or joyless America. "Nobody talks about how hard it is to go from this" -- insert a cut of a wonderful beach in Krabi -- "to this"--cut to a drab, damp suburban street somewhere in the West. Add a crying-face emoji. "I want to move here!" the traveller announces. True, everybody loves Thailand.
Girlhood and a city in flux
Life, Kong Rithdee, Published on 12/10/2021
» An Indonesian teen drama and Cambodian prize-winner shine at Busan Film Festival.
Back to the source
Life, Kong Rithdee, Published on 24/07/2020
» Evil is not banal in Ju-on: Origins, a particularly grisly six-part Netflix series. The J-horror wave that broke at the turn of the millennium may no longer be in vogue, but this supposed origin story of the 2001 Ju-On: The Grudge is probably even more extreme in its depiction of ghostly malice and vengeance. It's scarier too -- if you have a stomach for murder, disembowelment, matricide and self-combustibility -- because here the origin of violence is mostly domestic: the violence committed by father against mother, mother against daughter, husband against wife, friend against friend. It's a series (or you could see it as a three-hour film) about monsters that shows us that monstrosity really is born and raised first and foremost by humans.
Spirit of the mountain
Life, Kong Rithdee, Published on 30/11/2018
» The rugged village of Gatlang in Nepal is the subject of a documentary film showing at select Major Cineplexes this weekend. Director Pen-ek Ratanaruang and Passakorn Pramunwong seemed to have picked an unexpected topic for their new non-fiction work (after their collaboration in the political history doc Paradoxocrazy in 2013), and Gatlang turns out to be a soothing journey, part diary of a post-earthquake rebuilding and part portrait of the people in a remote corner of the world.
Mid-career recognition
Life, Kong Rithdee, Published on 29/08/2018
» Respect is earned, although in Thailand respect often comes with age. To motivate artists on the rise, the Office of Contemporary Art and Culture, Ministry of Culture, initiated the title Silpathorn Artist in 2003 to honour mid-career artists — those who've contributed to their respective fields for a number of years but still not 'masters'. The Silpathorn Award focuses on contemporary disciplines — fashion, architecture, literature, music, film, performing art and visual art — and recipients, who are between 30 to 50, represent the youthful, progressive energy in the Thai creative scene. An exhibition showing their bodies of work, from design sketches to a film screening, is ongoing at Ratchadamnoen Contemporary Art Center until Sept 9.
When literature becomes light
Life, Kong Rithdee, Published on 23/07/2018
» Haruki Murakami's books exert a strange pull that's earned him a devoted following around the world -- and Thailand is no exception. One foot planted in the reality of the modern world, the other trudging through a surreal dreamland as the ground beneath his characters' feet keeps shifting, Murakami entrances and confuses, lulls and hallucinates. His novels and short stories also occupy that exclusive territory in the literary world: he's a best-selling author who's also every bookmaker's favourite to win the Nobel Prize. He's also one of a few post-war Japanese writers whose style and substance transcend cultural and national boundaries.
Hoping to take the top prize East
Life, Kong Rithdee, Published on 16/05/2018
» Asian filmmakers have so far fielded a strong force at the 71st Cannes Film Festival, and when the Palme d'Or is decided on Saturday by the Cate Blanchett-led jury there's a real chance that the top prize might go to one of the Asian titles -- after a Turkish film in 2014 (Winter Sleep) and a Thai film back in 2010 (Uncle Boonmee Who Can Recall His Past Lives).