TROPICAL MALADY
Directed & Written by: Apichatpong Weerasethakul.
Produced by: Charles de Meaux.
Director of Photography: Vichit Tanapanitch, Jarin Pengpanitch & Jean Louis Vialard.
Edited by: Lee Chatametikool.
Released by: Strand.
Language: Thai with English subtitles.
Country of Origin: Thailand/France. 118 min. Not Rated.
With: Banlop Lomnoi & Sakda Kaewbuadee.

Apichatpong Weerasethakul's Cannes Jury Prize-winning Tropical Malady is proudly conscious of both its mesmerizing and aggravating effects. The tolerance limit for experimental films may be different for each viewer, but most will be shaken, whether it be with anger or astonishment, by what is not merely a film but a visceral experience.

Structurally similar to his previous film Blissfully Yours, Weerasethakul's sophomore feature film links two separate stories with a short in the middle, beginning with the awkward gay romance between a handsome soldier, Keng (Banlop Lomnoi), and a young country boy, Tong (Sakda Kaewbuadee). The couple's rendezvous are a disjointed patchwork of their experiences in the city and countryside of Thailand. Keng’s sexual desire is again and again quietly suppressed by Tong, until it culminates in a scene in which they lick each other's fingertips. But soon after, Tong walks off, leaving Keng in complete darkness.

What follows abruptly is a short crash course in Thai folklore. But after this transition, the director ceases to give any helping hands to the viewer. Keng reappears as a soldier hunting down a mythical shaman that has transformed into a ravenous tiger, preying on the village livestock. The shaman is revealed in human form to be Tong, his naked body covered in mystical scriptures. The cinematographers capture the Northeastern Thailand jungle in its suffocating majesty. And interspersed with charming details, such as a talking baboon or the animated ghost of a cow, the chase among the two men spirals deeper into the surreal.

Whether the two stories are linked to one another or whether Weerasethakul is retelling the same story in two different ways is open to interpretation. Because the memory of the first story will inevitably haunt and confuse viewers as they see the second, Weerasethakul is adept in creating what quite literally feels like a malady - a malady of love at its most insufferably obsessive.

Though Tropical Malady qualifies as an intelligently wrought art film, Weerasethakul could have compromised some of the film's inaccessibility. Without a thorough knowledge and appreciation of Thai folklore, the metaphorical depth of the film is lost, and the viewer is left to grapple for light in the darkness just as Keng grapples in the leech-infest, humid jungle. At the film's end, its protagonist is brought down to his knees in desperation, as will most of the viewers. Marie Iida
June 29, 2005