ApichatpongWeerasethakul Tagged Articles at Cinematical

I'm probably the wrong person to write this tribute, but I felt something needed to be said. I had never met, nor indeed had ever heard of Filipino-Canadian film critic Alexis A. Tioseco -- though he and I have been published in the pages of the same weekly paper -- or his Slovenian film journalist partner Nika Bohinc, who were killed by three burglars in their home in Manila last Tuesday night. (He was 29; she was 30.) A few of my colleagues knew them, and the heartfelt tributes have been pouring in. Raised in Vancouver, Tioseco moved back to his birthplace, the Philippines, in 1997. He started and ran a website called Criticine.com and contributed articles to other papers, magazines and websites. He focused mainly on Southeast Asian cinema, and felt that it was unnecessary to contribute to the already overloaded myriad of opinions on the latest English-language blockbuster.

Pop quiz: what was one of the most critically lauded films of the year, yet barely got seen in the US? Syndromes and a Century received many admiring reviews off its play at various film festivals and finished #4 in the indieWIRE Critics' Poll; DVD might be a natural home for director Apichatpong Weerasethakul's latest meditative drama. The Strand Releasing DVD is bare-bones, with only a few trailers included, but kudos to them for making this more easily available.

The Ten features an all-star cast in a comic dissection of the Biblical Ten Commandments. In his review, Scott Weinberg acknowledged the "fairly sketchy" framework but said he "discovered a solid handful of worthwhile chuckles in the flick." James Rocchi summarized: "The Ten's a wacky, hit-and-miss, shotgun blast of a comedy that stands apart from the corporate commodity comedy's become in major-studio Hollywood." The DVD from ThinkFilm includes an audio commentary, more than 55 minutes of alternate takes and deleted scenes, an interview, a "making of" feature, ringtones (!) and wallpaper.

PBS is broadcasting Robert Stone's JFK doc Oswald's Ghost starting this week, but it's also available on DVD with extra features, including an interview with Stone, "The Zapruder film and beyond," and a visit fo Dealey Plaza. In my review, I called it "the rare film whose power increases with distance," though I wish that more of Stone's opinions had been expressed. Maybe the DVD's extra features will add the "degree of balance of perspective that is otherwise missing from a very well-made documentary."

Kim Voynar felt Operation Homecoming: Writing the Wartime Experience, a documentary about a project that brought together distinguished writers, soldiers and their families, at times seems "uncertain of just what kind of film it wants to be," lacking any new insights into the Iraq War. She thought it would lend itself more to the intimacy of television "much more than the big screen." The DVD includes a discussion guide.

As much as I enjoy reading Top 10 lists -- and wondering if anyone actually saw all 600+ films released in the US during the past year -- I'm always looking for more, especially those from other countries. WiseKwai's Thai Film Journal has selected the "Top 5 Thai films of 2007." WiseKwai's top selection from Thailand has also found its way onto a number of US "best of the year" lists: Apichatpong Weerasethakul's Syndromes and a Century.

Here's the local twist: WiseKwai says that the film screened once for the press and then was pulled from release because censors objected to four scenes, which he details in his post. He feels that "far more lurid and violent films got a pass. Thai authorities had no good reason to pick on this gentle ode to the director's parents." The action galvanized the Free Thai Cinema Movement, which campaigned for a change in how the government treats films. Unfortunately, recent legislation to create a new film ratings system "still contains provisions for authorities to censor and ban films, which filmmakers had fought against." Syndromes and a Century will be released on DVD in the US on January 15, 2008.

In happier news, WiseKwai lists his other selections: Pen-Ek Ratanaruang's "good kind of weird" Ploy, Pimpaka Towira's political doc The Truth Be Told: The Cases Against Supinya Klangnarong, Kongkiat Khomsiri's period Thai boxing crime drama Muay Thai Chaiya, and Chukiat Sakweerakul's gay teen romance The Love of Siam. Thailand's Academy Award submission for Best Foreign Language Film, The Legend of Naresuan: Declaration in Independence, got an Honorable Mention along with sci-fi comedy The Sperm. That's a poster I'd love to see!