This year marks the fiftieth anniversary of the violent and tragic events that took place on 6th October 1976 at Thammasat University, when forty-six people, most of whom were students, were killed by right-wing militia groups and vigilantes. An exhibition organised by Thai PBS, Scene of Oct. จากรอยแผลสู่อนาคต (‘from scars to the future’), will examine the incident from multiple perspectives.
Scene of Oct. will feature poetry, music, and art inspired by 1976, and quotes from films that depict the events at Thammasat. It will even include a board game based on the incident.
Scene of Oct. will feature poetry, music, and art inspired by 1976, and quotes from films that depict the events at Thammasat. It will even include a board game based on the incident.
The exhibition is part of the VIPA International Film Festival 2026. VIFF runs from 11th to 25th September, and Scene of Oct. is on show from 21st September to 16th October, at the Thai PBS offices in Bangkok.
VIFF’s closing film, on 25th September, is Since That Wednesday... Fifty Years Caught Between Memory and Forgetting (เช้านั้นวันพุธ), a new feature-length documentary about 1976 by Kowit Phothisan, the editor of the Isaan Record (เดอะอีสานเรคคอร์ด) news website. The poster for Since That Wednesday... shows a red folding chair in an otherwise black-and-white scene, as in Chatchawan Thongchan’s short film From Forest to City (อรัญนคร), both of which refer to the infamous Neal Ulevich photograph from 6th October. (Since That Wednesday...’s original English title was The Unforgetting Wednesday. A shorter version of the film will be broadcast on Thai PBS on 5th October.)
VIFF’s closing film, on 25th September, is Since That Wednesday... Fifty Years Caught Between Memory and Forgetting (เช้านั้นวันพุธ), a new feature-length documentary about 1976 by Kowit Phothisan, the editor of the Isaan Record (เดอะอีสานเรคคอร์ด) news website. The poster for Since That Wednesday... shows a red folding chair in an otherwise black-and-white scene, as in Chatchawan Thongchan’s short film From Forest to City (อรัญนคร), both of which refer to the infamous Neal Ulevich photograph from 6th October. (Since That Wednesday...’s original English title was The Unforgetting Wednesday. A shorter version of the film will be broadcast on Thai PBS on 5th October.)
On the same day, the festival will screen the short student drama The Echo Remembered of Souls [sic], directed by Sassawat Kanayat. The film features a group of students planning an exhibition to mark the fiftieth anniversary of 6th October, though they disagree on how confrontational it should be. After a rather earnest discussion, they finally compromise and plan a display that acknowledges the victims but doesn’t show the violence of the event. The Echo Remembered of Souls was first shown at Mahidol University’s Prince Mahidol Hall in Salaya on 17th August, as part of Peace Festival Week 2026 (เทศกาลสันติภาพ 2569).
The festival will also screen Alfred Hitchcock’s Rope on 12th September. (Rope was previously shown at the Pridi Banomyong Institute in 2015, and at Bangkok Screening Room in 2018.)
The festival will also screen Alfred Hitchcock’s Rope on 12th September. (Rope was previously shown at the Pridi Banomyong Institute in 2015, and at Bangkok Screening Room in 2018.)
