Showing 81 - 86 of 86
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.
Bangkok Comic Con's back alley
Life, Adam Kohut, Published on 07/05/2015
» '[As Thais] we only adopt, poorly. We're not creating anything new. But such is the way of the Thai mentality. We don't lead. We follow. We want something we're used to. We like imitations. As content consumers, we like junk food."
Evocative hymn to Thai rice
Life, Kong Rithdee, Published on 23/01/2015
» This is the film you simply have to see this weekend. Uruphong Raksasad's Pleng Khong Kao (The Songs Of Rice) is a lyrical poetry of image and sound, as beautiful as 19th-century pastoral paintings and as evocative as murmured hymns. In a compact 75 minutes, we see muddied beasts stomping the paddies and whirring tractors aglow with nocturnal eyes; we hear the chanting for the Rice Goddess and rhythmic windpipe numbers for the harvest dance. We even marvel, unlikely as it seems, at a zonk-out sci-fi rendition of a northeastern rocket festival, ablaze with fire and sparks and songs and joy.
10 to see
Life, Published on 10/10/2014
» A banquet of movies is back to please gluttonous (not always a bad thing) cinema-goers at the 12th World Film Festival of Bangkok, which begins next Friday at SF CentralWorld. As usual, European titles, Asian mavericks, Latin American stories as well as hot documentaries pack the 10-day programme that shows a total of 60 films.
White masks then red masks
Terry Fredrickson, Published on 03/06/2013
» First Guy Fawkes-masked anti-government demonstrators gathered in downtown Bangkok Sunday. Then it was the turn of red-masked pro-government demonstrators.
Who burnt down CentralWorld?
Terry Fredrickson, Published on 12/07/2011
» Prosecutors will show today video footage which they hope will convince the Criminal Court to convict the men charged with the arson and looting of CentralWorld on May 19 last year.