This one is showing at the SanFran gay fil festival.

Please, see the trailer.

 

http://ticketing.frameline.org/festival/film/detail.aspx?id=3519&fid=52

It's been playing festivals all over. And winning lots of awards. I think Wolfe has picked it up for distribution/video

This is currently playing in Bangkok, I saw it last night, and I am surprised at how this is presented and discussed internationally as a "gay-themed movie" - it is anything but!

 

yes there are some gay and transgender characters and hence some gay aspects to the storyline but "gay" is irrelevant to the moral and social issues being examined in the film, and it is I think misleading for the review site linked to include "Discrimination, Gay, Homophobia, Sexually Explicit, Transgender" in the Genre/Subjects keywords

 

if you read the key two short stories in the book Sightseeing by Rattawut Lapcharoensap that "inspired" the film - the brothel scene and the conscription lottery draw - there are no gay characters. it is perhaps cynical to suggest that the director re-cast these as "gay" to attract just this type of attention and a wider audience overseas!

 

having said that, see this film - it is a classic and very depressing Thai coming of age story  that captures the (as it says in the review) "devastating disillusionment of an adolescent striving to understand a world that is deeply unjust despite all of its beauty"

 

and read Sightseeing - there are a number of very good Thai short stories in this collection.

 

Wise Kwai has an interesting review of the movie:

http://thaifilmjournal.blogspot.com/2015/07/review-pchai-my-hero-how-to-win-at.html

 

 

bkkguy

Thank you for this.  I look forward to seeing this.  As I am not in Thailand now, does anyone know if this will be in USA?

It's been to a bunch of gay and Asian film fests around. My guess is that it will be out on VOD and DVD before too long.

 

Here's an interview with the filmmaker

http://www.bangkokpost.com/lite/topstories/625768/ain-t-no-one-nationality-movie

 

And here's their Facebook page

https://www.facebook.com/WinAtCheckers?fref=pb&hc_location=profile_browser

meanwhile there is a veritable flood of "gay" movies coming to Bangkok including a gay vampire movie Red Wine in the Dark Night (started yesterday) and a gay ghost murder mystery The Blue Hour (starts August 6), both with interesting heritages -  Red Wine is the latest from the director of Insects in the Backyard and It gets Better, and Blue Hour is from the director of Down the River

 

The Bangkok Post interview with Josh Kim linked above is classically bad (Your film has gay characters. What is your most favorite gay-themed film?) and their interview with the director or Red Wine today is not much better:

http://www.bangkokpost.com/lifestyle/film/633192/pushing-boundaries

 

but as usual Wise Kwai covers it all fairly well:

http://bangkokcinemas.blogspot.com/2015/07/bangkok-cinema-scene-movies-opening_23.html

http://thaifilmjournal.blogspot.com/2015/01/how-to-win-at-checkers-blue-hour-and-so.html

 

bkkguy

I agree the BP interview was very poor.

 

I loved Insects in the Backyard.

 

Thanks for the news