Ploy

DUdeeeeeeee, i saw it today. I'm Thai, and i have to say that there are tons of crappy Thai movies out there. Of course,Thailand doesn't have such a big motion picture industry and most of the movies that make money here are usually retarded comedy movies or blockbuster blasts like war of the worlds or the incredibles. There are many GOOD movies came out here and don't make money at all or released limitedly such as MAgnolia, crash, babel, stay, 21 grams, stuff like that. Ploy fell into the same category with the above list. Ploy didn't make money. Ploy is actually one of the best Thai movies i've seen in a long time. it's good. it's got good story, good dialog (maybe not so good on subtitled, but if you understand Thai the dialog was actually pretty great). The directing was very very slowly but very moving anyhow. i personally love this movie. one of the reasons is because it's totally alienated from the typical Thai ghost, comedy movies. Ploy is really touching. I'm not going out with anyone now but this movie really made me think about 'LOVE' and relationships. There are a lot of changes i would like to make after i finished watching Ploy,but Ploy still made me feel like it wasn't a waste of time and money. It really will get you to think. Give it a try.

It is difficult to tell what the director's intentions were with this Thai film called Ploy. The three central characters are a husband (Wit) and wife (Dang) and a young woman (Ploy) the husband meets in an airport bar.

The film starts at a slow pace--appropriate as the tired husband and wife travelers arrive in Thailand in the early morning hours. But the pace remains sluggish until we realize that's the style of the film Then we discover that some happenings may only be the stuff of dreams.

Eventually, it becomes apparent that this is not a simple narrative. Side stories branch off, some action may be fantasy, and other plot developments seem to terminate without resolution.

Though it all, the "central action" that takes place in the couple's hotel room is filmed very deliberately. The camera lingers on vacated spaces. It traces the lines of architectural elements, rendering them cubist abstractions. It captures inactivity. The result is the film becomes a kind of meditation.

The film did not lose my attention. Although the storyline was ambiguous, I was still engaged.

Clearly the central theme has something to do with the shelf life of (married) relationships. Wit says, "Everyone is lonely. Most people don't know it because they're too busy." The film is named after the young girl's character, presumably because she is the catalyst that sparks the couple's imaginations and fears.

This is a real surprise and a most assured film from the Thai director, Pen-Ek Ratanaruang. Essentially a quite, thoughtful and insightful film with little storyline but half a dozen characters that totally fascinate. A husband and wife check into a Bangkok hotel in the early hours and in that never-never land of jet lag and an unfamiliar room a strange state develops. In reality, that is as well as in this movie. In fact we are not far into this little tale before we realize it is not easy to tell what is reality, fantasy or dream. Sometimes this can be irritating but here it is irrelevant. We are so drawn into this tale that even little details such as whether it is 'real' seem not to matter. I have not experienced anything quite like this since 'Celine and Julie Go Boating' and that was many years ago. Beautifully shot we find ourselves at one moment gazing at an entwined couple and at the next the sunlight dancing on the floor below a set of hotel room curtains. With plenty of space between 'action' there is time for us to reflect as the characters do and this magical and inspiring film is a most rewarding experience.

The basic structure of any story is that it have a beginning, middle, and end. I've seen several "art house" movies that lack an end, and I find that infuriating. While this movie technically has an end phase, there is no conclusion, and that's almost as bad. It poses several questions through various scenarios that may be linked (or not) and that may be real (or not). This violates the basic trust that should exist between film and viewer.

In a drama, we are asked to suspend our disbelief and indulge the director's vision; in exchange, the director is supposed to tell us a story that had some personal truth in it. This movie plays out more like an action film: there is no context for some people, and no resolution for any. It's like they're all background characters that exist purely to be ignored. This is a hard pill to swallow when the cast consists of half a dozen people.

All that being said, I thought the acting was good and the women were beautiful, so I enjoyed watching the film on that basis alone.

With fantastic induction of 6ixtynin9 and what was supposedly the peak of Pen Ek Ratanaruang as a director indicated in Last Life in the Universe came an expected decline of Invisible Waves (which was OK, yet not as good as the other two mentioned). But Ploy was a positive surprise! After the Invisible Waves which seemed to carry on with the ideas of Last Life in The Universe (hence, the director couldn't find or just didn't bother looking for a new, more creative approach) this was a completely new refreshment... just like Last Life in The Universe was at its time. I don't know if this is the best film of this prominent director (I cannot make my mind up... it's still between 6ixtynin9, Last Life and Ploy) but with Ploy he showed that he's still fresh and can strike hard unlike many "one movie" directors who are made famous by one appearance and then simply decline with other works. This is not the case here and this makes my sight attached to Pen Ek's works as closely as never before. A brilliant piece from one of the greatest directors.