POLITICAL GHOST FILMS

This is a part of an e-mail I sent to someone:


--I have seen only two feature films by James Lee—THE BEAUTIFUL WASHING MACHINE (B+) and BEFORE WE FALL IN LOVE AGAIN (2006, A+). I’m not sure if he’s a great director or not, but I think he’s a very interesting director, because his films has some distinct styles of his own. In my opinion, BEFORE WE FALL IN LOVE AGAIN seems like an antithesis of romantic Korean films. BEFORE WE FALL IN LOVE AGAIN share many elements with normal romantic films—handsome actor, very good male character, love triangle, some humour—but turns out to convey the opposite feelings of normal romantic films. I think one reason why l love this film very much is because I normally hate romantic films. BEFORE WE FALL IN LOVE AGAIN presents love life as very un-romantic, boring, and fake. And that’s what I like about this film.

Another reason why I like BEFORE WE FALL IN LOVE AGAIN very much is its lack of romantic music soundtracks. After seeing this film, I found that I couldn’t bear the use of mood-buidling soundtracks in many films I saw later. BEFORE WE FALL IN LOVE AGAIN has made me understand the fake feelings created by that kind of soundtracks.

--I have seen DORM (2006, Songyos Sugmakanan, A+), but I haven’t seen THE DEVIL’S BACKBONE. I like DORM very much, because it turns out not to be a horror film. In fact, I like some Thai films which are about ghosts, but the films are not standard horrors.

Some films in this sub-category

1.DORM

2.THE BANGKOK BOURGEOIS PARTY (2007, Prap Boonpan, A+++++)

This film is about some bourgeois people who kill a Thai person who has different political opinions from them. The dead person became a ghost and keeps haunting those bourgeois people. This is not a horror film, but this film makes me feel the most scared in my life, because this film seems to anticipate some civil wars which might happen in Thailand in the near future. In my opinion, the ghost in this film functions as the good conscience of those Thai bourgeois people. Those Thai bourgeois people can live their happy lives only when they can get rid of the good conscience in them. They must forget the suffering of the poor and the oppressed in order to live happily.


3.KHON HEW HUA (2007, Ping Lumpraploeng, A)

This is a story of a man who was beheaded, but refuses to die until he can make his wife and son live happily. It's a comedy, but I think Ping Lumpraploeng makes comedies like no other persons. Many people hate his films, but I like them.


4.COLIC: DEK HEN PEE (2006, Patchanon Thammajira, A+)

This might be a standard horror film, but it dares to talk about an important political event in the past which most Thai films dare not talk about.