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Quim
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Actually, I should say, Soi Cowboy, the movie by the same title. As the only appearance of one my favorite streets is a long shot from across Soi 23 in broad daylight, a punter emerges with two beauties. Enough to make my heart skip a beat, but hardly enough to name a movie after.
Saw the film as part of the Miami film festival with an audience of mostly elderly Jewish retirees who had no idea what just ran them over -- "What was that?! Was that filmed in Asia?" In fact, it was filmed on location in BKK, Ayuthaya, and Issan in grainy black and white and, suddenly and inexplicably towards the end, in color (for the scenes of rice farming, brilliant green and brown). Directed by Thomas Clay and "starring" Nicolas Bro (as a Danish whale) and Somulk Kuamsing (as his pregnant, petite, Issan TGF).
It is perfectly cast, and reflects truthfully a number of aspect of the typical falang/thai miscegenation, but overall it is painfully dull and slow, like Chinese water torture, like watching paint peel, like waiting for your TGF to show up... the film desperately needs a writer and an editor, scenes go on and on for no apparent reason, to the point of laughability.
But, the film also has a number of very funny, honest moments (albeit, a few gratuitous ones too), that I am sure most audiences do not even begin to understand, but which are all too familiar to the members here. Okay, spoiler alert, here is a detailed synopsis:
Opening shot: Large, corpulent Dane in a tiny "modern" BKK apartment sits on his black leather couch typing on his applebook amidst Thai guidebooks and DVDs. He is pale, large joweled and unshaven, with longish, thin hair. A typical viking.
He watches in silence his pregnant fiance prepare her breakfast of smoked fish and steamed rice. Her ass is very sexy. In fact, we can't help but notice that she is lovely, dark skinned and pretty, with striking eyes. Just my type. She is also very pregnant. No words are exchanged. We watch her eat close up, as over her shoulder we also "enjoy" watching through the open door the whale taking his morning ablutions, cleaning all the important spots. This scene lasts for at least 5 minutes - i.e., a f*cking eternity.
Transition: Having dressed, eaten peanut butter on toast (which we zoomed in on during a dramatic 3 minutes of silent camera movement), and still not having exchanged words with his Pregnant Issan TGF who does not look at him, the Whale leaves the claustrophobic apartment and goes down to the local 7/11. There an absurd and pointless comedy ensues as he negotiates his purchases and change. The viking does not speak Thai beyond a sawatdee krap.
Back in the apartment. Pregnant Issan TGF sweeps the floor on her knees with a handle broom and dustbin. He types some more on his laptop. A lush symphony on his ipod stereo, Greig?, Sibelius?, fills the room. Her gameboy is so loud that he decides to leave for "town". They exchange a few meaningless words. They still have not touched.
The whale emerges from the Nana sky train and I find my heartbeat hastening. He negotiates for some bootleg DVDs on Sukumvit, buys two penil enhacing pills at the local pharmacy for 1,000 baht (refuses the generic deal for 10, same price -- never heard of that one), and walks past Soi Cowboy without going in... At this point I am beginning to feel sorry for this guy.
Returns to the claustrophobic apartment: There he presents his thai-soap-watching Pregnant Issan TGF with a stuffed elephant and a gold chain, that he spent somewhere around 5K baht on, and that she is sure she can sell in times of "trouble" for 2-4K baht at least. She seems pleased with her whale and gives him a kiss. They watch some absurd vintage thai soap with a midget looking girl.
That night, he tries to get some action going in bed, but she turns her back to him. The viking tries again, sort of, pathetically, but she turns away again. He jerks off. (I am now definately feeling sorry for this poor sod. Gratuitous moment number one. He is in f*cking BKK after all, not Cleveland, Ohio.)
Pregnant Issan TGF goes to to meet her younger brother, gives him money (of course). He is wearing a huge amulet. She tells food vendor friend that her whale has a big heart and will marry her soon, but that he wants sex too much (this "falang want sex too much too often" was one of the gratuitous themes running throughout the film. For the record, I never want sex too much or too often.).
Back in the claustrophic apartment: Viking suggests they go to Ayuthaya to see the temples. Pregnant Issan TGF says she is tired. Whale says don't worry, they will stay in a hotel that night and go sightseeing the next day. And they will take the train, the best way to get there according to Lonely Planet.
On the train Pregnant Issan TGF says it smells bad and plugs into her ipod. The Whale has a never-ending conversation on his cellphone about some ill-defined business venture on the noisy train that is entirely pointless. They arrive in Ayuthaya and have a pointless conversation in the back of a tuktuk about driving cars. Pregnant Issan TGF looks hot in sunglasses and army cap. I find my mind drifting.
They check into hotel. In the elevator an elderly German woman with a walker says Pregnant Issan TGF is a very pretty and looks at the whale. We watch the elderly German use her walker to go down the hallway and then turn around, for no apparent reason, for about ten minues of silence broken only by the clackity clackity sound of the woman's walker...
Our favorite couple go out for dinner at some restaurant by the water. Pregnant Issan TGF says the food is bad and that she could cook better. The whale is clean shaven and looks like a very large teenager. Pregnant Issan TGF and the waitress have a long conversation in thai about the food and going with "falang" and "HIV" and so on and so on, none of it is translated for the audience or for the whale, who asks, what was that all about. How many of us haven't been in that situation? Pregnant Issan TGF says, oh, nothing, we talk about food, she ask if meet you bar, I say I not work bar, if people think I work bar, not think me good. (Another gratuitous/not entirely believable exchange.)
That night the whale pops a penil enhancing pill and has sex with his still unresponsive Pregnant Issan TGF, who we see sheds a tear afterwards as he lies panting on the other side of the bed. (Number one gratuitous moment of the movie.) Also, we see that his penis is immediately shrunken, not entirely believable if he had taken a V/C/etc. (except that he pops it right before the action).
Ayuthaya ruins. We spend the next 20 mins or so being given a tour of the ruins with the whale and Pregnant Issan TGF, which I partly don't mind as I have not been there yet. But it goes on and on and on. And on. She has an umbrella against the sun (which I find odd, since she is already black), and he has a stupid grin on his face because he finally got laid. Some might mistake it for love, but some of us know better.
Suddenly the movie is color and we are at Pregnant Issan TGF's family's rice farm, where younger brother shows up, helps farm some rice, visits with a local girl (who used to work SC) and some of her friends, and whacks off his older, alcoholic brother's head with a machete for some gangster in BKK. He returns with the head and presents it to the cliched thai gangster who shoots him in the back of the head as he is counting his kill money. The Thai gangster is wearing a huge amulet.
Confusingly, the Pregnant Issan TGF is the gangster's wife. She does not appear to recognize her younger brother who presents the bag with the head, but she looks in the bag and is moved to tears. She clings to the TG next to her for the rest of the scene.
The whale is sitting opposite her in a cream white suit and snake-skin boots with a very sexy TG. They pass post it notes back and forth for some inexplicable reason. What I believe is a well known male Thai/American mixed singer sings a couple of songs, including one at the end that has only one line and never seems to end. Like the movie.
The end.
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Thai Girls : Meet Sexy Thai Girls
Posted on: 9:55 pm on Mar. 7, 2009
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Kaymanx
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Don't be surprised if it makes it to the Academy Awards
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Bangkok Women : Meet Sensual Bangkok Women
Posted on: 5:58 am on Mar. 8, 2009
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Groover
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Hmmmm the good people at imdb.com share your feelings...
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I'll keep it simple and general enough so as not to drop a spoiler. But this film doesn't deserve to be watched and if anything, people need to be warned against it, because there is nothing to spoil! I had reasonably high hopes of a film that has managed to grace (or sully) screens at various film festivals around the world. This one just keeps coming back for more - in this case at the Stockholm film festival - after getting knocked down at each festival. The creators don't seem to be able to take no for an answer. I went in with an open mind and here is the story that ensues...
We open in grainy black and white with one of the good-hearted, well-meaning sex-obsessed painfully-shy main characters, Tobias, lying in his bed and his almost-mute pregnant Thai hooker cohabitee also in the bed. An ex prostitute who is taken under Tobias Christensen's wing. And there is almost no character development. Every shot is long, drawn out and PROTRACTED to death. to DEATH. A whole minute was devoted to watching the toaster for F£$%^ sake.
After we understand that Tobias is the money cow to look after the ex Thai prostitute, they eventually go on a relaxing temple trip after some seriously awkward and IRRITATING waste of film. Again, more extremely long, protracted and BORING... no wait, POINTLESSLY long shots are included. Was the editor murdered or something? The granny on the zimmer-frame, what were they thinking? There were two people in the audience behind me who fell asleep and began snoring - genuine because others sitting nearby were amused and laughing at this, there were tsks and hisses and sighs alike coming from the crowd directed at the screen by this point. AWKWARD.
Then the film becomes COLOUR! And another character develops: the Thai prostitutes little brother. He's on a bounty mission. He succeeds. More long, pointless shots. DULL. BORING.
He returns with the evidence of the deed to be paid by the man who supposedly hired him and encounter possibly the most exciting and mildly titillating 3 seconds of film in the whole 2 hours. Tobias flanked by another Thai hooker and also the "money safe" scene.
The dialogue in the film is either superfluous, or limited - but sometimes serves a purpose in a "connect the dots" way to understand enough of what is supposed to be going on plot wise in this film. Next to NOTHING.
burning your eyes from your sockets would be visually more stimulating than this film, and a damn sight more exciting. DO NOT WATCH.
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Sounds like a belter!
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Thai Girls : Meet Sexy Thai Girls
Posted on: 7:22 am on Mar. 8, 2009
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Quim
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In part because of the grainy back and white, but mostly because of the largo pacing and long single frame scenes, it did remind me of Jim Jarmusch's Stranger Than Paradise from 1984, a classic in the genre of silent endurance tests.
But Soi Cowboy, in comparison, makes Stranger seem positively action packed. And the latter doesn't feel pointless or jumbled at the end.
It's too bad, because this could have been an interesting, and first honest look, at the Viking impregnates Issan TGF saga.
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Bangkok Girls : Meet Sexy Bangkok Girls
Posted on: 11:43 am on Mar. 8, 2009
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