Narok sao Ta-ru-tao
Director: ?
Starring: 'Nicky' Theerakol, Dawan Singhwee,
Cherry Intira
Running Time: 110 minutes
Year: 2003
The good news is that Thailand has “Women in
Prison” exploitation films! The bad news is that Thailand has “Women in
Prison” exploitation films. If this is as good as they can do it, please
leave that genre to the experts! This is an amazingly bad film in every
way – bad to such a degree that I could only watch it in pity for the people
involved. I could imagine these actors being signed up – excited about
starring in a film - and then they go to the location for the first day's
work. The initial questions that probably popped into their heads were
“Where are we? Where are the sets? Where is the prison?” Prison? We don’t
need no stinking prison. This may be the first WIP film without a prison.
Avant-garde concept? A statement that life itself is a prison? No, I don’t
think so – there just wasn’t any money and they hoped no one would notice.
The correction facility is having a problem with
the female inmates escaping on a constant basis. It is not too surprising
since the prison has no fence. Oops – we never thought we would need one
of those. It also has no jailhouse and makes do with a small makeshift
stockade of wooden poles tied together by rope in which all the prisoners
are herded into. The administrators and guards don’t have it much better
as their “offices” consist of straw and plywood stapled together. A strong
wind and the prison would blow away. A light misting rain and the prison
would float away. So it is no wonder that the inmates attempt to escape
the bad food, poor décor, peeing behind the bushes, the brutish
guards and having their faces in this movie.
As the film begins three females have broken out
– ok not exactly broken out – they strolled away and are on the run – ok
not exactly on the run as they decided to stop for a nap - and the guards
nearly catch up with them. They leap over a cliff into the water below
and the guards follow suit – oddly the blonde head guard’s hair color changes
to black as he jumps. Move quickly to another scene in which the female
guard, Irada, is leading three new prisoners to their new home and two
of them push her and try to run away – great escape plan as she calmly
shoots them both in the back. It turns out she has something going with
the blonde guard – a little daily ritual in which she accuses him of messing
around with the inmates – he then calls her “bitch” and slaps her across
the face and follows this up with a deep dive kiss. Then at night she comes
back to his place for a little whoopee.
My kind of woman - a stone faced killer in the
day and a warm waiting hussy at night. In fact, as many romances break
out here as do prisoners - between the whiskey swizzling doctor and one
of the inmates, between a couple of the inmates, between an inmate and
Irada, between an inmate and the blonde guard, between the blond guard
and Irada - in fact this might be a cheaper option for those looking for
romance than a Club Med vacation. The film does include some basic WIP
elements – whipping, lesbianism, torture, rape and bad dialogue – but done
with the style and energy of an afternoon soap opera. In the end, all the
sets are blown up and I thought – geez what a shame – there goes $50 in
material up in smoke.
My rating for this film: 1.0