Oh man...
DAY 1: Confusion
The movie begins with an driving scene that rivals Manos: The Hands of Fate in terms of engagement. Unlike Manos, this scene actually has some other people around the road and some voice is selling fish. Also it only lasts five minutes.
Some woman on the back of the truck is telling a story about how her father sold her for a bus ticket and she ran away from home. Two minutes later, the film-maker asks if she know any stories. This documentary is only a little over an hour and a half long, and they interview many people, so it's understandable that they can't fit everything in and have to prioritize. If the movie spent more than two minutes on the backstory of their first character, it would have cut into valuable driving screen time.
Since the makers of the documentary thought her true story of abuse was boring, she tells them a fictional story about a disabled boy who has to stay home and a woman who comes in every day to teach him.
The boy asks the teacher to tell him what she did today. It cuts to another story. So we are watching a movie about someone telling a story about telling a story to someone else to someone else. This movie is weird. I had to rewind because I wasn't sure whether the teacher is talking about herself or about the woman who is telling the story. If it's the latter, my comment about the backstory is moot.
The woman in new story buys some sandals with her friend. Then a crucial text box appears.
The woman with whom the film-makers are interviewing says this, so the woman is telling a story about the teacher who is telling a story about herself. Watching this movie is like playing with Russian Nesting Dolls that are all the same size.
Cut to the hair salon. The teacher gets her hair done. Cut to her on a motorcycle. Was that worth fifteen seconds of screen-time?
She goes into her house and she narrates internally about a man physically abusing her. Is she still telling this to the student? Is this about the woman's uncle? I got this movie at an obscure DVD shop where the cases are empty and you have to bring the one you want up front, and then they give you the disk in a clear case. I mention this because maybe the original DVD came with a road-map or something and there's no way I can understand it without one.
This is the case I got:
The next scene is back to truck, but two seconds later it cuts to the teacher and her student, but you hear people calling out fish prices, which happened in the truck section. We are only 18 minutes into an hour and 24 minute film and I can't keep track of who is telling the story. Maybe at the end of the movie there will be a twist that ties everything together,
The boy hears his teacher fall in the other room and wheels over to find her lying down, unresponsive.He drags her over to the couch and props her up. An object rolls out of her skirt. It's mysterious. It's...I'm not sure what time it is, but I hope it's noon. I want at least one thing to make sense in this movie, even if it is just the title
This would be a good cliffhanger if they decide to just cut away right now. It would be, except nothing in this movie is coherent.
That doesn't stop the movie from cutting to more riveting driving. The only good thing about this is that I know we are back to the main main story.
I found this movie because I was at an obscure DVD shop and knew there had to be some film there about disabilities. I searched for a long time before picking this one up because it said there was a disabled boy in it. It's hard to talk about this movies portrayal of disability because a) so far the boy hasn't been in it much and b) I'm having enough trouble recapping the plot.
Some more driving and they find another woman. They apparently have told her the story up until the object falls out of the dress off-screen. Good thing, or this movie would get extremely repetitive.
The woman asks whether the object can turn into a kid. They tell her to do a wisdom check, and she rolls a 12. After modifiers, the DM declares she can make the object transform.
So the woman starts talking about how a star fell from the sky and transformed into a kid who had no family. Then the film returns to the ongoing tale about the boy and the teacher. I know people with disabilities being special stars is a common trope, but this is a bit too literal.
Less than an hour to go...
So now the second woman is babbling on about...stuff. Most of this movie is just "stuff".
People are playing volleyball and talking, but the subtitles stopped working here for some reason. If I cared, I might try to look up what they were talking about.
Finally back to the story-in-the-story. The boy in the wheelchair and an able-bodied boy move the teacher's inert body to a laundry bag tent thing. The able-bodied boy tells the boy in the wheelchair to leave because he can handle it.
This is ableist because it implies that people with disabilities need help to hide bodies at potential crime scenes. Good message, and one society needs to learn.
The teacher comes back and the boy asks how she got out of the closet. The teacher ignores his question and asks what happened, to which the boy replies "There was a mysterious boy who came out of your skirt."
I know it's pretty pointless to have standards on a blog about disability exploitation films, but I'm above making a joke about how a boy under a woman's skirt made her come out of the closet.
Now some older boys are talking about the story, saying that the boy transformed into the teacher and the woman is not the real teacher or something. Then they ride some elephants.
I give up on this movie.
The film cuts to a girl who asks the boy the following beautiful question:
The answer is NO. I have no idea what is happening.
Someone unzips the closet and the teacher's body falls out.
I give up. 33:18 minutes into this 1:24:09 movie and I give up for today.
By the way, this film has a 7/10 on IMDB but only 638 votes. I feel like I'm in a class where I have no idea what the professor is talking about but everyone else is nodding and I don't know whether they understand or are just nodding because everyone else is so I start nodding as well.
DAY 2- A New Hope
I just reread my notes from last "class". I thought if I slept on it, everything would make sense. Nope
Shot of the boys. Shot of a woman riding a train, with the audio of her telephone conversation with the doctor saying she found a similar line on her back. I really, really hope this subplot is leading to something.
Now the filmmakers find a third woman to continue the story. They play a tape-recorder with the "story" thus far. This actually helped me understand the story. Vaguely. The teacher never left the closet- when she returned to meet the disabled boy, it was really the boy who fell from the sky who transformed into the teacher. I don't know how I missed that last night- it's all so logical.
The third woman says that story she wants to tell is not really connected to the ongoing story, and asks whether that is okay. I think we've reached the point of no return about thirty minutes ago.
In the new story, the boy helps the "real" teacher out of the closet. And...musical number! Why not? The fake teacher sings that she will use a trick on the crippled boy and make him believe in him. A caption appears to remind use that she is in fact the mysterious boy. This probably sounds like I'm just summarizing the movie poorly and it will makes sense if you watch it. If you want to, good luck
Then the two teachers make him choose which is the real teacher and which is the mysterious boy. He chooses the real teacher...I think.
By the way, the teacher's name is Dogfahr. They have mentioned it twice.
I keep thinking that there is no way this movie can go further off the rails, and then this happens:
I'm trying, I really am, but it's so hard to care about this movie. Every time I manage to summarize a section, the movie throws in something new.
So.. this family is having an argument but there is no sound. Why?
This new boy is talking to Dogfahr and offers to marry her. I thought he turned into a giant and tried to kill Dogfahr? Why am I still questioning this?
The disabled boy says "I will wait until the day I can walk. And I will get back at him." I could talk about the ableism in this scene, but analyzing this movie would be impossible, since I can't even summarize it.
The characters say "The end." Finally! And only 41 minutes in. It's strange that they have about 40 minutes of credits.
Not really. Actually, that was a play. What?
The woman is on the train again. I'm sorry for just saying "woman" over and over, but I'm having trouble identifying characters. Is that racist?
The next scene is at a boxing match. They are boxing to raise money to cure Dogfahr's neck. This is the only subplot that makes sense. My theory is that she went to a hospital for the marks on her neck, they had to put her under anesthesia, and this entire is her rambling when she woke up.
These three people are talking. One of them says "Too much like a game. At least you should have had a script." The other two are the film-makers. They are my least favorite characters right now.
The next storytellers are a man and a woman. The woman asks why the boy is crippled, and the man replies from birth. Good to know.
Except not. the second storyteller (she's back) says that the boy was injured in a plane crash. Complaining about that lack of continuity in the film would be like shattering a vase, and then picking up one of the shards and complaining that the paint is a little chipped.
We learn that the boy's family is off in the Pacific war and that's why the teacher looks after him. Sure, why not? The characters start talking to the cameraman again and ask if they are done filming. This is a documentary. I keep forgetting that.
The character just...sit around and talk and eat. The camera likes to hold on shots for a long time. Now back to the train. There are shots out the window. The first woman and her husband(?) argue about toothpaste. The second woman is sitting in front of them. I don't care. 59:17 to 59:38 is just a slightly shaking shot of the interior of the train and 59:38 to 1:00:04 is just a shot of the tracks out of the back of the train. The movie officially arrives at Manos' territory.
24 minutes left. I can do this.
Dogfahr and the boy enter the train and the other characters recognize them. What? Then the train arrives and there are some riveting scenes of characters eating. This caption appears.
What?
Two deaf women continue the story in sign language.
These people are talking about bartering boys for cheap labor. A radio announcement comes on to announce that the government has declared World War II is over. I'm glad that crucial plot thread is resolved. The Americans arrive in Thailand and start imposing all these laws while an upbeat song plays. I would say this film has an agenda, but I don't want to think about this movie any more. Dogfahr goes to bar to work as a singer and dancer. The boys became waiters and dishwashers.
Schoolchildren continue the story. I have to give them credit for understanding it so far. One child says the mysterious boy went to get flowers, but a tiger wants to eat him, so the boy kills the tiger. and the boy is an alien, so the teacher goes, but another tiger eats her, and her boyfriend who was the crippled boy wants revenge on the alien and the alien kills the boy.
You know, this part of the story makes the most sense.
The alien cremates the crippled boy. THE END.
Not really. A good alien comes down to earth and heals the boys legs and gives him a sword so he can defeat the evil alien. The End. The children argue about telling a story about a witch tiger, but nobody knows it, so they tell a story about an uncle telling a story about a witch tiger.
I wish I could say I was making this up.
The children start telling the story within the story about a boy who goes to pick Ping fruit and the most beautiful thing happens.
The credits start rolling.
Anyway, there's a woman underneath the Ping tree and she turned into a witch tiger, then the uncle grabbed his gun and shot at the witch tiger, who fled into the forest. 10/10 story.
The credits say that the movie was told by Siamese Villagers and that filming ended in 1998. There's a subtitle that says "At noon", and then we see children playing. Get it? Noon. Like in the title.
Shots of the children playing soccer. The scene focuses on their legs. I feel like I should make some mention of able gaze or something to connect this back to the point of the blog.
6 minutes left.
A series of shots of buildings, and people. It has no connection to anything.
Children play on the dirt and their mother calls them in for lunch. There is a goat and a cat and a dog. They tie a car to the dog's collar and the movie ends. Was that a worthwhile shot to end on?
The real credits start about 1:20:58 in. So I was spared 3:11 of movie. Thank god.
Maybe I just don't "get" it, but this is one of the most miserable films I have ever watched. Sometimes incomprehensible films can be fun, but there is no connection between events in this movie. I really shouldn't put this on the blog because it has nothing to do with ableism, but I want to feel like something productive came out of this.
Also, what was up with the rash?
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