Since the September military coup that toppled the government he has been pushing forward with a series ambitious plans to extend his grip on the country's entertainment market. He had bought one company, accumulated a large stake in another, taken some of his property assets public ...
* Prostitution in Thailand: Her fate, or choice?—Apa Insight Guide Thailand
By far, most patrons in Thailand are Thai men, yet foreign johns also fuel the demand. They not only come on sex tours from Europe, Japan and Malaysia. There are also conspicuous communities of middle-aged and elderly Western men who live in Pattaya, Phuket and Bangkok solely for the availability of cheap sex, child sex and younger wives. Many make a living by teaching in English schools.
* Reviews from the Bangkok Film Festival—Culture Vulture
The most repugnant deception is the fairy-tale time and place. The narrator tells us that his parents met "40 years ago." Yet in the late 1950s, the entire country was wracked by a Mao-induced famine that killed up to 30 million people. Emaciated or bloated from dropsy, the villagers would be scrounging for grass, weeds and bark. And this isn't a fertile, rice-growing area. It appears to be low, thinly-forested hills--the sort of area where the half-dead fed on human flesh. If we push the time up to 1960, there still wouldn't be such abundance ...
* Striking oils—Sawasdee
Citrus hystrix is one homely fruit. The size of a handball, it has the lumpy wrinkled surface of a green brain. No Thai will profess to eating it. It’s too bitter and “strong” smelling.
* Scenes from a Small Country—Wall Street Journal
It’s an unlikely scenario for a filmmaker from Thailand, especially someone from the dusty northeastern city of Khon Kaen. The son of two doctors, he saw little art and no art–house movies when he was growing up. After earning an architecture degree in Khon Kaen, he enrolled in the School of the Art Institute of Chicago. It was there ...
Susan J Cunningham 