FOREST OF DEATH
Hong Kong/Thailand, 2007, 97 minutes, Colour.
Shu Qi, Ekin Cheng, Rain Li.
Directed by Danny Pang.
With a title like this, one knows that one is in the Pang Brothers’ territory. They have made ghostly thrillers like The Eye and The Messengers as well as a rather deeper, imaginative thriller, Recycle. Forest of Death is produced by the Pang Brothers, Oxide and Danny, but is co-written and directed by Danny.
It’s one of those well-crafter Asian stories of spirits. This time the spirits are in the forest and in the trees. A young scientist and his assistant are conducting experiments to find and interpret the sounds that the trees and the plants make in the forest. In the meantime, the scientist’s girlfriend is an ambitious television host and is introducing a ratings-boom series on ghosts and on a spate of suicides in a local forest. In the further meantime, a young detective is investigating a rape and murder in the forest. She thinks that the scientific methods may lead the accused to confess his guilt if he goes into the forest and is tested by the machines.
That is more or less what happens except that the reporter becomes jealous of the detective, tries to push her way into the police site in the forest and is rejected. She herself undergoes a terrifying experience as she is lost. There is also an old man who puts up notices on the trees warning people against suicide – he had lost his daughter who had killed herself there.
To sceptical eyes, it looks like a load of nonsense. However, Danny Pang keeps it moving and, with the Asian predilection for mysterious spirits, there is enough eeriness to satisfy the market.
1.The Pang brothers and their horror films? Ghosts and spirits?
2.The Thai settings? The details of the forest? The laboratories? Police headquarters? Television, the media? The media in the forest? The musical score?
3.The title, the suicides, the visualising of the young woman going into the forest? The information given about the suicides? The spirits of the dead? The old man and his notices, his warning people against suicide, the grief at his daughter’s death?
4.The reporter, her eagerness, fronting the shows, the high ratings, her producer? Her relationship with the scientist? Her being on the go, aggravating the situation, the population being interested in the suicides? Her being too busy to celebrate the scientist’s birthday? The party at the studio? The experiment in the forest, her trying to barge in, her being rejected, following the scientist home, seeing the police detective? Her program, her being upset, going into the forest, trying to get the contact with the scientist, the producer angry with her? Her being lost, frightened? Near death? Her being rescued?
5.The scientist, his assistant and his lack of attention? The nature of their experiments, the sounds from the forest, the machinery? The reverberation with the cut to the plant? The contact from the police? The new equipment? Going into the forest, the set-up, testing the confession of the accused? The success of the experiment? The concern about the reporter, her being lost, found, rescued? The scientist and his future?
6.The detective, her work, the rape and murder case, the confrontation with the accused, his sinister lawyer? The denials? Going into the forest, the experiment, the effect on the accused, his confession? Her continuing her work, collaboration with the scientist?
7.The accused, callous, his story, its being visualised? His laughter, the reaction from the forest, on the machine? His experiencing the attack himself, his confession? The lawyer backing out?
8.The nature of Asian films about spirits, belief in spirits, the spirits of the dead, the spirits in nature? The use of these to concoct a popular narrative, detective story, paranormal experience?
