black tiger tears
A bazooka in a western movie? That’s exactly right. All kinds of explosions. It slowed down like a cartoon. And melodrama. Acting in the sky. Not just flowers, but gorgeous colors that breathe life into them, overwhelming and powerful beauty.
Director Wisit Sasanatien told reporters: “I wanted the audience to feel like they were reading a novel with moving illustrations. It’s pure imagination and it’s completely unrealistic. It’s about our roots. “I wanted to go back. I wanted to create a link between the works.” Tradition and modernity in our own unique style. ”
A first-time Thai director has created a truly artistic B-movie, the likes of which America has not seen in years.
“Tears of the Black Tiger” was the first movie I ordered from Netflix, back when Netflix was a DVD-by-mail service.I remember the intense confusion I felt, the joy I felt when I witnessed something completely strange.
Blatant mustaches, unapologetically sentimental ballads, outlaw crowds, Casablanca stage lights, radioactive noir.
Tears of the Black Tiger is the first Western on this list and is fundamentally different from the first generation of Westerns and all generations before it.
Sasanatien’s directorial debut, Tears of the Black Tiger, was the first Thai film to be screened at the Cannes Film Festival. Since then, the filmmaker’s eye for explosive, beautiful and dramatic imagery, and his talent for combining tragedy and quirky humor, have earned him a place at the forefront of Thailand’s new wave movement, and in the past three years he has The work was released on Netflix. Year.
There’s all this Old West American influence in this movie, but there’s obviously just as much Thai influence, most of which I admittedly know very little about.
One of my sources of inspiration, right down to the soundtrack, is Sergio Leone’s films. Leone is famous for making “spaghetti westerns,” but Sasanatien said his film is about “Tom Yum Goong Cowboy,” a reference to Thailand’s unique noodle soup.
All of this adds up to a truly artistic B-movie that hasn’t been seen in America in many years.
Sasanatien also cited moody Thai pop ballads, some of which gave him a vision of “a beautiful frame of two men shooting in the rain”.
The outlaw boss will be played by Sombat Metani, a legendary Thai actor who has appeared in over 600 films and holds the Guinness World Record for the most film appearances.
It’s a very playful film with lots of crazy experiments.
The characters act strangely in a manic scene change, without anyone ever explaining why. The video has an eerie quality that makes it seem “out of place”, like an AI video from 25 years ago.
An unabashed love story mixes with cartoonish violence. Melodramatic emotions flare up, and heads and bodies explode like pumpkins. Severed arms fly through the air as bandits kill soldiers.
Winchesters were replaced by LMGs, grenades, and what remained of Mauser rifles. The shooter is his six, but his bullets can cause unprecedented damage.
Anything can happen at any time. The laws of our universe do not apply. It’s a mash-up of so many styles, techniques, devices, and influences, all rushing at such a breathtaking pace that it’s impossible to tell what’s an homage and what’s new. , so that the whole thing is brand new.
Sasanatien furthers this disorientation by streaming digital video onto 35mm film stock, resulting in a combination of futurism and classicism that pervades the film.
“Tears of the Black Tiger” combines the breathtaking scenery Western movies have always captured with obvious fabrication.
The boat floats through perfect flowers, giant lily pads, and dense thickets of tall grass, transporting the characters from one decorative pavilion to another, where they discuss rain and love. , only a bare pastel background appears inside. Sun.
Best of all, this ultraviolet spectacle is delivered with unmistakable conviction, even in its more flashy, tongue-in-cheek moments, all with a stylistic excellence that even Wes Anderson would be envious of. No disrespect to Mr. Anderson, but his quick wit gets in the way of this fascinating slop show.
It’s a Western that’s been reshaped through so many translations that it’s all half-heartedly familiar to the genre, like an absurd dream full of characters who take themselves too seriously.
It feels low budget but decorative and artistic at the same time. This Thai film takes revisionist westerns to unimaginable new heights.
Conversations can sometimes become quite poetic. Others are belligerent and unreasonable. There is no way to predict what the next line will be.
Our heroes (one of whom is a dwarf in a cowboy costume, the other may be an homage to Leone) are in the midst of a storm cloud of villains who live to kill innocent people. Heroic only in relation to threat. Next, the heroes kill innocent people. Eventually, there are no real heroes, but everyone is so dramatic that you can’t ignore anyone.
Sua Dam (Black Tiger), who wears all black and plays the harmonica, wasn’t always so hurt and vengeful. We jump through time to understand his anger.
But it’s too fast-paced to add any emotional depth to a storyline that involves more betrayal and death than ten Westerns. This actually increases the narrative power of the story. There is something to be admired for not skimping on the development of the plot.
It’s over before you know it, with dizzying pleasure, whiplash from non-stop action, and a series of fight scenes that are too beautiful to grasp and that even the most satirical, violent, and over-the-top video game would never have. It will continue to develop. .
