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