Tropical Malady (Apichatpong Weerasethakul, 2004)

[Michael]

Never seen a Thai film. I would love to venture into the Thai cinema. While researching a bit, Tropical Malady caught my attention. It had already been released in NYC last year but surprisingly none of my NY friends said a word about it!

So for those of you who have seen Tropical Malady, how is it?

[zedz]

Superb, sublime. I have no idea how the second half would translate to the small screen, however. After an ominous intro, the film spends its first hour as a relaxed, sweet gay romance. At its halfway point (just after we've been reminded of the ominousness of the opening) we are treated to a brief, mysterious fable and are then plunged into a dark, spacy slow-motion action film as a soldier tracks a wild beast/man through the jungle. The film culminates in a transcendent, mystical sequence that I can't really compare to anything else in cinema. Live-action Miyazaki at his most sublime probably comes closest.

[yoshimori]

I'd recommend all the Weerasethakul films, but especially Tropical Malady (my favorite movie of 2004) and Mysterious Object at Noon (with its exquisite corpse structure).

The other great film of contemporary Thai cinema is Tears of the Black Tiger, a color-coded musical-western-melodrama-romance. Most everyone loves it.

The Ratanaruang movies are ok. The most recent, Last Life in the Universe should be on DVD this month.

[Michael]

Since watching Tropical Malady two weeks ago, I still fail to come up with anything to say about it. I mean I can describe the film superficially but I'm utterly clueless about the film's meaning.. what it tries to say.

Unquestionably a very beautiful film - mysterious and enthereal. It captures possibly the most wonderful, sweetest romance between two guys I've ever seen in film. That gets me thinking why there aren't more films showing this type of romance. I love the part when a woman takes the two lovers to a beautiful cave and then to her home to have a meal with her sister. Smoke pot, go to the mall, etc. A very warm, wonderful sequence.

Halfway through, the film takes a sudden detour to a totally different world - the jungle with talking monkeys, a naked boy, and a tiger.. The tiger is sublime.. his piercing eyes scared, alarmed me at first but then at last like the soldier, I surrendered to his shattering beauty and power. I guess that's what the director tries to achieve if I'm not wrong. But do I understand what all of that means? Especially how it relates to the first half. No. But it still doesn't make me think any less of this amazing experience.

[Oedipax]

Does anyone know if a R1 release of this film is forthcoming, and from whom? I'm very tempted to just order the R3 copy reviewed on DVD Beaver, except that the extras are not subtitled and I'd hate to miss out if indeed they are ported to some upcoming R1 release.

[Michael]

Throughout the summer, I find myself returning to this film again and again and it keeps getting better. My god. No film in the entire history is like this strange, gorgeous film. Like Matt said somewhere on the forum, the film is best left unexplained but at the same time, I starve to gain more understanding of what's really going on in the film. I'm still uncertain whether its the films intention to remain a mystery or my ignorance of the Thai culture, folklore, etc.

I'm fully confident to say that this film is simply the best film I've seen in the past decade at least....inked in my skin yes.

[feihong]

I haven't thought in extreme detail about the film--I don't think that's the best way to approach a film like this. It seems to do something similar to Antonioni's films, juxtaposing visual tones and environments. It seems to me that the first part of the film deals with humans as social beings, and then the second half in the jungle means to deal with a subconscious world that is deeply personal, about the wild aspects of our own personalities and the various ways they work and the various extents to which they work. Dunno. Something like that. I think it's a very great film, even though I can't come up with very specific references as to why.

I took some friends to this, people whom I know to enjoy intellectual challenges--the movie picked up such hate from them. They were convinced there was no connection from scene to scene, that there was no character development (mostly true, but character and story aren't stylistic tropes this film even deals in), and that there was no point ot the film. They mocked my suggestion that the film actually traded on visual juxtaposition rather than story exposition, and they felt that the film was made to be pretentious and incomprehensible.

I was kind of floored by these comments. I felt that they were groundless, and I could debate them on their own terms as being bankrupt criticisms, but since I had no completely coherent reading of the film it made it hard to convince anyone that they'd actually seen something good. Even if the pretty much undeniable truth was, that they had. Again, I dunno. Great movie!

[yoshimori]

but since I had no completely coherent reading of the film...

You are right. Like music, most of the best films aren't meant to be "read". Watch, feel, love.

[For an introduction to the damage done by the 'reading' school - which includes, sadly, just about everybody - see the late Susan Sontag's short essay, "Against Interpretation".]

[Michael Kerpan]

Like music, most of the best films aren't meant to be "read". Watch, feel, love.

Personally, what I most like to do is wallow in them.

MEK

[Steven H]

This is a great film to "wallow" in. There are so many beautiful moments. I loved it, and I'm *not even gay*, wow! I really enjoyed your review, Feihong. The unspeakable beauty of this film is what etched it into my brain (or "inked" as Michael said.) However, there are at least a couple avenues for interpretation. For one, I'd like to hear the upcoming director's commentary, and secondly there was a great piece about this in a recent Film Comment (by a writer I'm familiar with, but forget his name right now) which had shed some light on a few things for me (mostly cultural references) and added much weight to it.

[shirobamba]

For an introduction to the damage done by the 'reading' school - which includes, sadly, just about everybody - see the late Susan Sontag's short essay, "Against Interpretation".

And for an introduction of the 'reading school' see the rest of Susan Sontags essays, especially her brilliant reading of films.

[yoshimori]

And for an introduction of the 'reading school' see the rest of Susan Sontags essays, especially her brilliant reading of films.

I quite like her analyses of Bresson, Godard, etc. But do you really think those what-you-call 'readings' are of the type she criticizes in "Against Interpretation"? [Apologies for straying off-topic.]

[Brian Oblivious]

there was a great piece about this in a recent Film Comment (by a writer I'm familiar with, but forget his name right now) which had shed some light on a few things for me (mostly cultural references) and added much weight to it.

Probably Kong Rithdee's piece in the May/June issue?

[Michael]

I just came across this personal analysis on IMDB. Pretty chewy, huh?

I just watched this film, which I missed in its general release, on Dvd. And by the way I am not Asian, although I am gay. Here is my take on the film, after some time for deliberation. Admitedly, my immediate reaction at the end was confusion and annoyance that the central thread of the narrative seemed to get lost somewhere along the way.

The major clue to me (note the original title) lies in the opening text about the beast WITHIN EACH OF US that we need to 'tame' in order to be integrated into the human family and what you might call ones proper destiny. In the Soldier's case it seems that this Beast is his innate homosexuality, or at least his deep, sensual, yet in a sense delicate, attraction, bordering on love, to the peasant boy. This attraction rises to it highest tide immediately preceding the highly symbolic, quasi-mystical, extended episode in the jungle (their mutual kissing of each other's hands). At this point the peasant is an equal partner, if not the aggressor, in the mating dance that has begun. FORGET his being shy or straight.

So the Soldier enters the forest (often a symbol for the UNCONSCIOUS in literature and myth) on something not unlike a Hero's Quest to subdue this inner demon or Beast. He has his gun with him, food, etc. He knows that the Beast is elusive, cleverly hidden, even disguised, and formidable.They alternately track each other and both physically and spiritually wrestle with each other. Survival itself is at stake. One or the other must succumb.

BUT at the end the Soldier offers himself to the Beast (i.e., his HOMOSEXUALITY, or more specifically his love for the peasant boy). He indeed exorcizes demons, but not the ones we had been led to believe that he would--quite the opposite: the cultural/tribal/familial/religious rules socialized into him over many years that he now sees as inherently false or at least not applicable to him These are precisely the source of his deepseated doubts and fears). At last he can integrate ALL the parts of his Identitiy/Consciousness into a unified whole. He is now ready to go BACK to the world, announce his love to the boy, and commit himself to some kind of meaningful relationship. In hindsight the final moments of the film visualize in exquisite detail the unique human passage, that hopefully we have all experienced or will experience at least once, when one totally accepts the engulfing madness, the metamorphic power, the sacramental blessing, the human miraculousness of love.

In absolute cinematic terms, in order to better understand the pacing, silences, and contour and landscape of the interior struggle with ones unseen but powerful and most palpable demons that dominates the final sequences of this film, see the recent masterpiece "Spring, Summer, Fall, Winter...and Spring". These sequences cannot be rushed, nor these lanndscapes glossed over hastily, without sacrificing or at lease seriously compromising their existential authenticity. Not to mention the combined terror and awe that we experience when confronting them.

For me this film is a kind of meditation or poem on the mystery of love, specifically in this case male/male love, and is to be cherished as such. I fear that we in the West are too literal in our coming to terms with such films. The cardinal rule is always in Art TO ENTER THE REALM OF THE ARTIST OR ARTWORK, not to force him/her or it to conform to ones own experience, biases, preconceptions and. experiential limitations. How can we grow otherwise, or gain wisdom!! And Art is one of the Master Teachers that life has given us. If possible, anesthetize the left brain, that linear part of us that prefers judging, analyzing and organizing experience over experience itself, before sitting down to view a film.

[Matt]

I don't get it. He submits the film to several paragraphs' worth of pop-Freudian analysis and then says "The cardinal rule is always in Art TO ENTER THE REALM OF THE ARTIST OR ARTWORK, not to force him/her or it to conform to ones own experience, biases, preconceptions and. experiential limitations. How can we grow otherwise, or gain wisdom!!" [sic, obviously]. I'm glad he liked it, I guess, but I feel sorry for the person who reads this and goes, "Oh, NOW I get it!"

[Michael]

Exactly. I love how people can get carried away when explaining movies in this manner. Reading it left a big smirk on my face.

Oh believe me, I still don't get Tropical Malady and I intend to keep it that way. That's the pure magic of the film.. why ruin it?

[Brian Oblivious]

Apichatpong will be doing a close study of the film over two nights in April at the Pacific Film Archive in Berkeley, CA. April 5th and 6th.

[The Fanciful Norwegian]

For those in Los Angeles or the immediate environs, Apichatpong has a new exhibit/installation opening at Redcat on April 18, along with a mini-retrospective of sorts (screenings of Malady, Mysterious Object at Noon, Blissfully Yours, and a program of short films).

[John Cope]

Brian Darr's notes on viewing the film with Apichatpong in attendance.

[Grand Illusion]

I know nobody wants to explain too much in this film, but there's one edit that really bothers me towards the end of the film. I wanted to see if anyone would take a stab at it:

Spoiler

Once the soldier begins crawling around on his hands and knees, we get the shot of the tiger. The edit sequence is as follows:

Tiger
Soldier Crawling
Tiger
Soldier Crawling
Soldier in Ski Mask leaning against tree
Soldier Crawling
Wide Shot of Forest (Gunshot heard)

Then the Ski Mask Soldier is never seen again. So the Soldier in the Ski Mask? His face is obviously obscured. Is this the same soldier that is in love with the boy? The expected linear cut would not have soldier crawling-soldier standing-soldier crawling, so I am inclined to believe this is a different soldier. If it's the same, then I'm inclined to believe it's the same soldier watching himself crawl around on the floor. Perhaps he kills himself with the gunshot?

I'm more than willing to interpret the images my own way. The sequence was just unclear to me, and rather than interpret what I saw, I was trying to clarify. Anyway, this cut took me completely out of the film at a rather crucial moment of the Soldier's submission to the Ghost Tiger. I found it to be a poorly-timed edit and wanted to know if anyone read it differently.