Showing 1 - 10 of 10
Will gentrification respect city's people?
Oped, Kong Rithdee, Published on 28/06/2023
» We've lived for over a century in the shadow of grandeur: near the Customs House, known to Thais as rongpasi. "We" means my maternal family and the community of Haroon Mosque. Each day before sunrise, the muezzin's sing-song call rings through the neighbourhood, carried on the river wind towards the Mandarin Oriental Hotel, the French Embassy and Assumption Cathedral.
Nang Nak at 20
Life, Kong Rithdee, Published on 26/07/2019
» Thai cinema saw a new horizon open 20 years ago up this month. On July 23, 1999, a little film called Nang Nak opened in cinemas. An adaptation of the country's most popular ghost tale about a wife who died in childbirth but stuck around as a spirit waiting for her husband to return from war, the film arrived carrying high hopes -- and exceeded all of them. Nang Nak, directed by Nonzee Nimibutr and written by Wisit Sasanatieng, unleashed an unprecedented momentum of enthusiasm and became the first Thai movie to blaze past the 100-million-baht mark at the box office.
Toon and Pai, the tale of our two Jesuses
News, Kong Rithdee, Published on 23/12/2017
» Let's say, modestly, that Toon Bodyslam is Jesus Christ.
Armed to the teeth, with no battle to fight
News, Kong Rithdee, Published on 15/07/2017
» When everyone else is dead, the arms dealers will sip champagne and cuddle Playboy bunnies. Why? "Because everyone else will be busy killing each other," said Yuri Orlov, the arms dealer in Lord of War as portrayed by Nicolas Cage. When his client orders him a shipment of machine guns used in Rambo, Mr Orlov, an award-winning salesperson, asks, "Rambo part 1, 2 or 3?"
Still the champions
Life, Kong Rithdee, Published on 13/09/2016
» On Sept 30, the Bangkok bohemians will have our rhapsodical ecstasy. We've probably heard Bohemian Rhapsody 1,001 times, but for many it will be the first time we'll hear it live. "Queen + Adam Lambert On Tour 2016" will make a stop at Impact Arena with legendary rockers -- Brian May on guitar and Roger Taylor on drums -- charging through its repertoire with the new flamboyant frontman.
Braving the mainstream
Life, Kong Rithdee, Published on 04/09/2015
» What's so romantic about a public hospital examination room? "It's a small, closed space. The two people in there can't escape each other," says filmmaker Nawapol Thamrongrattanarit.
Past actions lead to sense of numbness
News, Kong Rithdee, Published on 04/07/2015
» The date is June 18, 2026, and this is a diary from the future. Thailand in 2026 feels like 2015 in many ways, except it’s worse, despite the half-finished high-speed rail to Chiang Mai — the budget bloated from three trillion baht to five trillion baht in 2020 — and the half-finished Pak Bara deep-sea port — the budget didn’t bloat, but the government shifted its priority to buying nuclear submarines.
In search of the next hit
Life, Kong Rithdee, Published on 26/06/2015
» A string of box-office failures, an absence of hits, an onslaught of Hollywood blockbusters, an economic slump, the vacillating, unpredictable taste of audiences — all of this has plunged the Thai film industry into a gloom in the first half of 2015. Home-grown cinema can barely compete with the American juggernauts, but the past six months have been particularly wounding. Usually, Thai films take around 25% of the ticket sales, with Hollywood gobbling up the rest (the total box office value was around 4.5 billion in last year). This year, so far, local movies took a paltry 10%, according to industry analysts.
Our ‘saviours’ say shut up, put up, pay up
News, Kong Rithdee, Published on 04/04/2015
» Death and taxes are the only two sure things in life, so the joke goes. I had a nice time at the tax office last week, three days before the deadline. It wasn’t a “fun time”, which is impossible, but nice enough in my dealings with a courteous tax lady who performed her arithmetic gifts with a pencil and calculator, smiling and helpful in her office full of paper and weary-looking taxpayers — some of them street vendors and odd-jobbers, I gathered. There’s something Kafka-esque about a visit to the Revenue Office: The mild dread (of what?), the anxious wait and, above all, the wild guess about the bureaucratic labyrinth that delivers our payment into the invisible state coffers.
The Lottery labyrinth
Life, Kong Rithdee, Published on 22/10/2012
» For 230 years Thai people have gambled on the lottery _ legit and underground, paper-based and imagination-prone. Along with every discussion of the lottery comes a whole syllabus of tangled subjects: economic value, political manipulation, tax structure, legal philosophy, morality, superstition, national character, the distribution of wealth and luck.