Motel Mist

Bangkok Screening Room will be showing Motel Mist (โรงแรมต่างดาว) on 2nd September, followed by a Q&A with its director, Prabda Yoon. The film was dropped by its distributor (TrueVisions) the day before its original release date, and was subsequently released independently.

Queer Film Festival

This month, Bangkok's Museum Siam is hosting a Queer Film Festival. There will be free outdoor screenings of contemporary gay films on 12th, 18th, and 25th August. The event begins with Queer DigiThaized, five short films shot on digital video, including Thunska Pansittivorakul's Vous vous souviens de moi? (ในนฝนตกลงมาเนสส). The five films were selected by Nontawat Numbenchapol, director of Boundary (ฟ้าต่ำแผ่นดินสูง), who will take part in a post-screening discussion with Tanwarin Sukkhapisit, director of Insects in the Backyard (อินเซค อินเดอะ แบ็คยาร์ด).

Bangkok Joyride III

The third part of Ing Kanjanavanit's epic documentary Bangkok Joyride (บางกอกจอยไรด์) opened last week at Cinema Oasis. Chapter three, Singing at Funerals (เพลงแห่ศพ), covers the PDRC demonstrations from 15th to 26th January 2014, when Suthep Thaugsuban escalated the protest with his 'Bangkok Shutdown' campaign. (Chapter four, Becoming One, will cover the PDRC's sabotaging of the 2014 general election.)

Singing at Funerals follows the same format as the first two chapters, How We Became Superheroes (เมื่อเราเป็นยอดมนุษย์) and Shutdown Bangkok (ชัตดาวน์ประเทศไทย). Filmed on Ing's iPhone, it features excerpts from PDRC rallies (including speeches by Vasan Sitthiket and Ing herself) and extensive footage of street processions. The coverage ultimately becomes excessive: the camera follows Suthep for half an hour as he collects donations from an endless line of protesters. There are also numerous shots of Thai flags being waved, and this fetishisation of the national flag has been a consistent feature of Bangkok Joyride.

Family Flicks Month

This month is Family Flicks Month at Bangkok Screening Room, with a season of classic family films including Disney's Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs (also shown earlier this year during Scala's World Class Cinema season). Snow White is showing on 5th, 8th, 9th, 11th, and 12th August, and tickets are free for children.