Jenjira Pongpas
2021Morakot
Apichatpong Weerasethakul
Jenjira Pongpas, Sakda Kaewbuadee
Morakot is a derelict and defunct hotel in the heart of Bangkok that opened its doors in the 1980's: a time when Thailand shifted gears into accelerated economic industrialization and a time when Cambodians poured into Thai refugee camps after the invasion of Vietnamese forces. It was a hosting time. Later, when the East Asian financial crisis struck in 1997, these reveries collapsed. Like Kamanita, the unchanged Morakot is a star burdened with (or fueled by) memories. Apichatpong collaborated with his three regular actors, who recounted their dreams, hometown life, bad moments, and love poems, to re-supply the hotel with new memories.
Emerald
สุดเสน่หา
Apichatpong Weerasethakul
Kanokporn Tongaram, Min Oo
Min is an illegal Burmese immigrant living in Thailand who has contracted a mysterious painful rash covering his upper body. His girlfriend, Roong, and a middle-aged woman, Orn, take him to see a doctor. Min pretends that he cannot speak because he is not fluent in Thai and speaking would reveal him to be an illegal immigrant.
Blissfully Yours
Cemetery of Splendor
Apichatpong Weerasethakul
Jenjira Pongpas, Banlop Lomnoi
In a hospital, ten soldiers are being treated for a mysterious sleeping sickness. In a story in which dreams can be experienced by others, and in which goddesses can sit casually with mortals, a nurse learns the reason why the patients will never be cured, and forms a telepathic bond with one of them.
Cemetery of Splendor
Uncle Boonmee Who Can Recall His Past Lives
Apichatpong Weerasethakul
Jenjira Pongpas, Sakda Kaewbuadee
Suffering from acute kidney failure, Boonmee has chosen to spend his final days surrounded by his loved ones in the countryside. Surprisingly, the ghost of his deceased wife appears to care for him, and his long lost son returns home in a non-human form. Contemplating the reasons for his illness, Boonmee treks through the jungle with his family to a mysterious hilltop cave—the birthplace of his first life.
Uncle Boonmee Who Can Recall His Past Lives
My Mother’s Garden
Apichatpong Weerasethakul
Sakda Kaewbuadee, Jenjira Pongpas
Glistening objects from a jewelry collection inspired by carnivorous plants are transformed into a colourful sea of garden creatures through hand-drawn animations of roots, insects and various other organisms. A loving tribute to Weerasethakul's mother's garden. Commissioned by Dior; first presented at Musée de l’Orangerie, Jardin des Tuileries, Paris, to mark the opening of a new set of jewellery designed by Victoire de Castellane, 27 February 2007.
My Mother’s Garden
A.W. A Portrait of Apichatpong Weerasethakul
Connor Jessup
Apichatpong Weerasethakul, Connor Jessup
Canadian actor and filmmaker Connor Jessup (Closet Monster, Falling Skies) profiles Apichatpong Weerasethakul, a maverick of Thai cinema who explores the slippery nature of time and consciousness with a sublimely idiosyncratic, often surreal approach to film form.
A.W. A Portrait of Apichatpong Weerasethakul
The Anthem
Apichatpong Weerasethakul
Jenjira Pongpas, Sakda Kaewbuadee
The Anthem is a celebration of filmmaking and the viewing experience. In Thailand, before every cinema film screening, there will be a Royal Anthem before the feature presentation. The purpose is to honour the King. It is one of the rituals imbedded in Thai society to give a blessing to something or someone before certain ceremonies. The Anthem presents a 'Cinema Anthem' that praises and blesses the approaching feature for each screening. This audio-visual purification process is performed by three old ladies. They also channel energy to the audience in order to give them a clear mind.
The Anthem
Fireworks (Archives)
Apichatpong Weerasethakul
Jenjira Pongpas, Banlop Lomnoi
This film depicts Bunleua Sulilat’s temple/sculpture garden 'Sala Keoku', located in northern Thailand. Passages of blackness sporadically dissolve under the fitful internal illumination of sparklers, which light up to reveal Sulilat’s unorthodox temple populated with a fantastical concrete menagerie of beasts and figures; the sculptures range from the broad, whale-like contours of a frog’s face, to a cavalcade of dogs on mopeds, to a pair of skeletons partially embracing as if sitting for a double portrait. These images are interspersed with those of an older Thai couple mysteriously wandering around the temple like wraiths, the woman’s plodding progress hampered by the use of crutches.
Fireworks (Archives)
Fever Room
Apichatpong Weerasethakul
Banlop Lomnoi, Jenjira Pongpas
"Fever Room" features Jenjira (Jen) and Banlop (Itt), two of Apichatpong’s regular actors who also appear in his film, "Cemetery of Splendour". Like the film, this projection-performance presents the layers of reality and fantasy. Apichatpong fuses his memories with the actors’ and fictionalises the narrative. Here the people takes refuge in dreams while their land is on a brink of collapse, echoing Thailand’s present state of military dictatorship.
Fever Room
