DOI BOY
Thailand, 2023, 93 minutes, Colour.
Awar Ratanapintha, Arak Amornsupasi, Bhumibhat Thavornsiri.
Directed by Nontawat Numbenchapol.
Noted Thai documentarian, Nontawat Numbechapol, has made his first feature film, incorporating many of the social issues explored in his documentaries. With a running time of only 93 minutes, there is almost too much material on the one hand and, yet, insufficient treatment of some of them on the other.
And, the structure of the film seems rather piecemeal, set incidents and themes, touching on aspects, introducing characters, then letting them go. And, by the time of the ending, with audience interest in several of the characters, their each being given a final appearance (one of them a disappearance), sometimes enough to see what the future might be, other times not.
The film is set in Chang Mai, in the northern part of Thailand, and sufficiently near the border with Myanar. The film shows the streets, the buildings, the neighbourhoods, but then explicitly focuses on a gay club, Dho Boy, the Drag Queen compere, the audience, a striptease sequence, quick glimpses of activity amongst the men at the club, then the closing of the club and those working there needing new jobs. In fact, throughout the film, there are some gay incidents and an emphasis on homoeroticism.
However, the action focuses on Ji, who attends the club but who has a pregnant wife. He is enigmatic, sitting in the club watching, pressurised by some stand over men, then going out, abducting gay protester and killing him. Then, it emerges that he is part of the police force.
The action also focuses on a monastery in Myanmar and the armed forces demanding that some of the monks be recruits in the Army. One of them, Wan, later called Sorn, decides to leave and make his way to Thailand, teaming up with another man, crossing the border in the boot of a car, offered a job at Doi Boy, performing, acting as a prostitute, yet heterosexual with a girlfriend, and the girlfriend and others performing as prostitutes at a karaoke bar. The former monk encounters ji and gives him a sensual massage.
Then there are the protesters, the gay couple, one of the murdered by Ji, the other abducted, on the hit list to be killed, but Ji giving him the opportunity to be saved, by going back into Myanmar, to the monastery, to disappear. While Sorn and his companion have been trying to get passports, delayed, police interference, Ji pressurises Sorn to accompany the expedition to the monastery. The protesters have been marching against human trafficking. They are also protesting against disappearances.
There are various tangles on the way, the local military, helping the protester to escape, then accompanying him to the monastery, a homoerotic sequence of nude bathing on the way, then the young man, head shorn, robes, and his presence at the monastery, exiled from Thailand, uncertain. While Ji has given the protester an opportunity for a new life, he is also left Sorn’s passport for him to return home.
Ultimately, Ji seems to have disappeared, his wife searches for him,n Sorn’s girlfriend is persuaded to liaise with a wealthy client, and Sorn is seen walking towards the border.
Significant themes but the film is something of a satisfactory/unsatisfactory mixture.
