One Take Only
Director: Oxide Pang
Stars: Pawarit Mongkolpisit, Wanatchada Siwapornchai
Time: 88 minutes
Year: 2003
An Oxide Pang film is always
a treat visually and this is no exception. One would think that he suffers
from some sort of rare instance of sensatory attention deficit after watching
this film. He seems bored if any two scenes in a row have the same look to
them and so he is constantly playing with the hues, the lighting, the speed,
the angles as much to amuse himself as the audience. And to some degree it
works. For example there is one scene in which the two protagonists finally
have the mandatory sex scene – but Pang films it in such a way that the coupling
runs along the bottom of the screen, goes vertical, upside down and all over
the place completely disorienting the viewer, but giving it a small sense
of wonder – that’s how sex should be! As much as his film tricks entertain,
they can’t completely hide the fact that there is very little going on in
this film. But the lackadaisical pacing of the film until it finally verges
towards near the end on a plot of sorts is part of its charm. Still from
time to time you have to ask yourself, why am I interested in these people
and what goes on in their lives - and there is really no answer. Yet
his visuals make the film compelling and its short running time blows by
very quickly.
Bank (Pawarit Mongkolpisit
- the assassin in Bangkok Dangerous) is a small time slacker drug dealer
who fantasizes about being a tough guy but on the one occasion when he tries
to be he gets his butt handed to him and has to be rescued by the diminutive
Som (Wanatchada Siwapornchai) who quick thinkingly puts some bricks into
her bag and uses it as an assault weapon to beat off four guys. The two strike
up a friendship and learn that they live in the same building. What he doesn’t
know is that she is also a prostitute who arrives at work in her school uniform
and makes enough money to pay for school and to send some home. Pang makes
it clear that he is at odds with the material youth in Thailand – in one
almost cinematic aside he stops the film to show a poor young girl selling
flowers on the street to cars passing by and when one car stops this barefooted
urchin just stares inside at a girl of her own age who has everything while
she has nothing.
This materialism also drives
our loving couple into a few errors of judgment. They fantasize about what
they would do with a lot of money and it all comes down to new clothes and
a cool cell phone. So Bank decides to push the envelope in his drug dealings
and go for bigger and potentially more dangerous payoffs – and soon they
are swimming in money and living good – but one has to wonder how long before
the hammer comes down on them. Both actors give if not technically good performances
– likeable ones and in particular Wanatchada is a sweetie.
My rating for this film:
6.0