Daily Times

With cat-like humans, soldiers infiltrating an art gallery and brainwashed cadets, dystopian “Ten Years Thailand” is the latest in a pan-Asian film series aiming to stir political debate that debuted in the kingdom Thursday.

The original in the “Ten Years” series came out in Hong Kong in 2015 on the back of the “Occupy” pro-democracy protests, with versions from Japan and Taiwan exploring nuclear fallout and socioeconomic problems.

The premise asks film-makers to wrestle with the subject of what their country will be like 10 years from now, resulting in unsettling visions of bleak futures.

Big guns from Thailand’s new wave cinema, including Apichatpong Weerasethakul and Wisit Sasanatieng, worked on the four short, dark satires on army rule, censorship, mob mentality and cramped free expression, that premiered at Cannes in May.

The creators of the omnibus movie, which made it past Thailand’s unpredictable film censorship board, see it as a clarion call to encourage critical thinking in a nation run by generals since a 2014 coup.

The target audience are “people worried about the direction the country is going and unhappy with the military being so powerful for the next 20 years”, director Aditya Assarat told AFP.

Aditya’s episode, “Sunset”, shows soldiers scouring an art gallery for politically incendiary works, inspired by a real-life confrontation last year in which security forces showed up at a show and ordered exhibits to be removed.

Published in Daily Times, December 14^th 2018.