If you are a fan of Thailand, this is a must-see movie. However, be warned: If you don't prepare in advance, you are going to understand as much about this movie as a Thai person will understand upon sitting down and watching a movie about the War of the Roses.In fact, you will be further lost because a lot of this movie relies on cues and hints that non-Thai people have no chance of understanding. You have no chance of hearing the accents, or figuring out which person is the King of Phitsanolouk and which person is the King of Lansang by the way the courtiers around them are dressed. (Nobody bothers to explain in movies about the American Revolution who the guys wearing long red coats are, so don't feel too slighted.)
In order to prepare yourself, know this: This movie regards four countries, representing 4 cites in modern Southeast Asia... (1) Phitsanulok, where the boy, Prince Naresuan is from, (2) Ayuthaya, where our hero's uncle is from, (3) Suksawatdee (modern-day Bagu) in Burma, where the conquering king is from, and (4) a small part played by Lansang (modern-day Vientienne) in Laos. Each country has its own king, a replacement king, at least a prince or two, and the odd queen or princess standing around being valiant.
There. You're all set. Go find those places on a map, and then read the first 2 paragraphs of this wikipedia entry, and you're sufficiently prepared to watch this 2½ hour movie. Like I said though, pay close attention and take mental notes early on to get the faces straight. It won't spoil the movie to lose the plot, and the movie is generally forgiving if you do lose it, but you might as well try to stick with it.
That said, I repeat: This is a must-see movie. This one in particular (of the 3-part movie being made) for the average farang living in Thailand. Why? Because this movie spends about 90% of its time in court or in temple. These are all things that we, as foreigners have never seen on film or been properly taught about. Thai people can grasp the day-to-day activities of court and temple, but we haven't had an entire lifetime of exposure to Thai culture to absorb these things. The educational value of this movie in terms of learning Thai culture cannot be stressed highly enough.
In addition, the Thailand presented here (Burma actually) is the Thailand of your dreams... where the cement shop houses, karaoke bars, and noisy motorcycles are all swept away, and for 2½ hours you can enjoy the pristine and beautiful way that Thailand used to be with grass huts, gorgeous wooden houses, grand carved palaces, and peaceful temples.
There are some battle scenes, to give you an idea of what 16th-century Southeast Asian warefare was like (the next 2 movies promise much much more warfare), and a good dose of light-hearted fun to keep the mood from getting too somber, and — like I said, if you are able to follow along — a fairly good history lesson. I will state however that this is more like "Braveheart" than The History Channel when it comes to the factual details. But don't let anything I said about following or understanding this movie discourage you from seeing it. You won't be dissappointed.Here in Pattaya, a seating for this movie starts at the Big C approximately every 20 minutes or so. Thai language, English (good English) subtitles.
2 comments:
Nice and helpful comment :) The first movie was excellent, yes difficult to understand, although I just watched the Naresuan Part II tonite and I must say it was - tiring, so confusing on the verge of a headache, torture. Its mainly about war, and I can go on to grumble for pages, war is supposed to be fast, decisive, and for God's sakes atleast we deserve the right to know who's fighting who and who's the good guy and who's the bad guy but its ALL sort of mixed up. Like suddenly one hero guy is running from the primary battle and its hard to make out whether they are retreating or it is a plan. But part II was like, there must be like over 20 super slow motion sequences of canon explosions, arrows piercings, sword cuts, MY goodness its supposed to be a war, and its like fast, slow, drag, super fast, super drag, super drag, super drag, super drag - like you are almost about to shout 'yipee' when a good guy rescues a good girl but they make it so super slow motion just that we are waiting for the villian to fall off the horse so we can say 'yippe' but - the moment's gone! its just another wasted build-up and useless scene.
Nice and helpful comment :) The first movie was excellent, yes difficult to understand, although I just watched the Naresuan Part II tonite and I must say it was - tiring, so confusing on the verge of a headache, torture. Its mainly about war, and I can go on to grumble for pages, war is supposed to be fast, decisive, and for God's sakes atleast we deserve the right to know who's fighting who and who's the good guy and who's the bad guy but its ALL sort of mixed up. Like suddenly one hero guy is running from the primary battle and its hard to make out whether they are retreating or it is a plan, this part was like, there must be like over 20 super slow motion sequences of canon explosions, arrows piercings, sword cuts, MY goodness its supposed to be a war, fast and desiive! but here its like fast, slow, drag, super fast, super drag, super drag, super drag, super drag - like you are almost about to shout 'yipee' when a good guy rescues a good girl but they make it so super slow motion just that we are waiting for the villian to fall off the horse so we can say 'yippe' but - the moment's gone! its just another wasted build-up and useless scene. i mean ok thai cinema, we accept, we know you can do great visuals and effects and super slows, cool, it looks great, but sorry your visuals no matter how good the story you are trying to tell is more important, thats what people are going to see in the first place! whats the use when people watch 3 hours of confusion and then leave the hall still asking, so who was that guy with the pirate's bandaid, and did they mention portugese? and oh so are those mountain people thais or burmese?
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