PRINCE
Prince Gomolvilas is a Thai American playwright and performer, who co-stars in JUKEBOX STORIES—a storytelling, song-singing, bingo-playing, theatrical extravaganza—that will be performed on June 24 and 26 as part of the National Asian American Theater Festival in L.A. He also wrote the stage adaptation of the Scott Heim novel, MYSTERIOUS SKIN, which launched East West Players’ 2010-11 season, and he runs BAMBOO NATION, an arts and entertainment blog. He recently started taking Muay Thai lessons, so he is confident that he can kick your ass. (If you’re six years old.)
During the summer of 2003, I was taking a stroll through Old Town Pasadena, a quaint neighborhood that happens to have a touch of street cred because of the porn store that’s crammed between the upscale restaurants and clothing boutiques. I passed by the now-gone United Artists movie theater and saw a poster for a foreign horror flick called The Eye (2002). I remembered reading somewhere that the filmmakers, identical twins Danny & Oxide Pang, were born in Hong Kong but frequently worked in Thailand. This didn’t quite make them Siamese twins (ha!), but since they were somewhat connected to “my people” I decided to saunter into the cinema for a fun and delightful afternoon matinee.
The movie scared the living shit out of me.
A blind woman receives a cornea transplant, but, along with her new vision, she is also able to see dead people. Sure, the seeing dead people thing has been done to death, but the Pang Brothers are clever visual stylists who expertly alternate between quick genuine “jump” moments and unbearably long scenes of utter dread.
Dead Asian children appear out of nowhere, so, because dead Asian children are scary, I found myself screaming out loud at one point, “Jesus Christ!” And I’m not even religious.
The only other time I screamed out loud in a movie theater was when Jennifer Lopez was finally ready to seek revenge against her abusive husband in Enough (2002) . I yelled, “J. Lo. has had enough!” at the screen, and my friend Rica yelled, “Kick his ass!”
I’m reminded of all this because lately I’ve been revisiting some of the most notable Thai horror movies in recent years. You see, later this summer I’ll be writing and directing Spirit House, a short Thai American horror film, so studying movies such as The Eye is a part of my research and pre-production. (Film historian Andy Richards classifies The Eye as a part of Thai New Wave Cinema, even though the film is a Thai/Hong Kong co-production and is mostly in Cantonese.)
I’ve barely begun my research process, but, by the looks of it, I’m going to have a hell of a time getting through it.
In his book, Asian Horror, Richards cites the original Shutter (2004) as another fine example of Thai horror. I began streaming the movie through Netflix one night recently, but had to stop it during the opening credits because I was too scared. You see, I live alone with my 21-pound cat, Pork Chop. Although I could probably bludgeon a robber to death with Pork Chop, dead Asian children are already dead. Wielding my cat ain’t gonna do jack shit.
Two nights later, I started watching Shutter again. The film is about a couple who begins to see ghostly figures in photographs after they commit a hit-and-run. (They crash their car into a young girl and leave her for dead in the middle of the road.) In one scene, the male protagonist develops a photo in his darkroom and notices the side profile of what looks like that young girl (only dead). Suddenly, the girl in photo whips her head around and looks directly at him. That’s when I screamed “Jesus Christ!” and turned off the TV again—because if there’s anything scarier than dead Asian children, it’s dead Asian girls.
I think most Asians are frightened of their mothers (I am!), so their fear of dead females is intensified. (That makes psychological sense, doesn’t it?) My own mother is acutely aware of this fact. Whenever she wants me to do something I don’t want to do (like fill out government paperwork or, like, give her a hug), she threatens me by saying, “If you don’t do this, I will come back as a ghost to haunt you after I die.” So I end up doing whatever she wants me to do. Call it paranormal blackmail.
Anyway, I managed to convince my friend Jake to come over to my apartment one night to watch Shutter with me, even though he doesn’t like horror movies. (Yeah, he’s more of a pussy than I am.) The film is so unnerving that Jake’s presence didn’t really help me any—I screamed “Jesus Christ” during one sequence, scaring the neighbor kids downstairs. Jake was so unsettled by Shutter that he tried to keep his eyes off the screen and on an issue of GQ magazine the whole time. (There’s irony in that somewhere, isn’t there?)
At the time of this writing, I am about halfway through Dorm (2006), another Thai ghost movie, this time set in a creepy boarding school—but I only have about 30 minutes of daylight left. It doesn’t look like I’m going to finish this film today.
Goddammit, next summer I think I’m going to write and direct a movie about cats. Fluffy cats.
I saw The Eye at the Arclight way back when – fantastic – and I remember that prior to the film, there was a warning specific to that film about the scares about to happen.
All I remember is that it had mannequin heads and a jump scare – I’ve never seen it since, even on the DVD.
Jerome, you might want to check out The Eye 2 and The Eye 3 (sometimes known as The Eye 10). They’re not as solid as the original, but there are some genuinely scary scenes in both of them. The Eye 2 ALSO features an terrifying elevator sequence that builds off the first one, and The Eye 3 plays around with a bunch of f*cked up Thai superstitions. I believe both can be streamed through Netflix.
I couldn’t drive in the night for 2 weeks after I saw “Shutter”. It’s haunting
Pork Chop will protect you. If anything, your rotund feline companion will honor your life by eating these Asian children of the dead. JESUS CHRIST! haha!
You think that’s scary…go watch some documentaries on the financial crisis in this country!
@caramelfrap: OMG, that ghost girl on the car almost made me shit my pants.
@roger: You have more faith in Pork Chop than I do.
@Howard Ho: You still peddling your vaudeville act?
The $700 trillion deregulated derivatives market almost made me shit my pants!
Wuss.
Great post!
I needed some great summer movies to get scared to, these sound perfect.
Louise
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