Subject Librarian
Dartmouth College
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Internet resource(s)
- International Thai Film Festival
International Thai Film Festival a.k.a. ITFF brings together film, animation and entertainment industry professionals from around the world, celebrating and awarding the very best productions and artists, from emerging talents to seasoned professionals. ...
Keeping up with the journal literature
Want an easy way to keep up with the journal literature for a national or regional cinema? And you use a mobile device? You can install the BrowZine app and create a custom Bookshelf of your favorite journal titles. Then you will get the Table of Contents (ToCs) of your favorite journals automatically delivered to you when they become available. Once you have the ToC's you can download and read the articles you want.
You can get the app from the App Store or Google Play.
Don't own or use a mobile device? You can still use BrowZine! It's now available in a web version. You can get to it here. The web version works the same way as the app version. Find the journals you like, create a custom Bookshelf, get ToCs and read the articles you want.
Introduction to Thai cinema
The first public film screening took place in Bangkok in 1897, and the Siam royal court commissioned films and recorded ceremonies at the turn of the century, with Prince Sanbhassatra a keen amateur filmmaker. Cinemas began opening from 1905, with programmes dominated by imports from Japan and the West, especially France. US films increasingly dominated the market from the late 1910s, with the Siam Film Company establishing a near monopoly on distribution and exhibition. A key early feature was the US-Thai co-production, Suwan/Miss Suwanna of Siam (Henry MacRae, 1923), and the first domestic feature proper is usually considered to be Chok Sorng Chan/Double Luck (Manit Wasuwat, 1927). Influenced by the benshi tradition (see japan, film in), imported synchronized sound films were often described by a professional narrator who provided dialogue and sound effects, a practice that continued into the early 1970s. A national censorship regime was established through the Cinema Act of 1930, and while the transition to democracy in 1932 led to significant changes in Siamese society, film censorship remained firmly in place. A domestic film industry began to develop in the 1930s: the Siam Film Company was superseded by the Saha Cinema Company; and the Sri Krung Sound Films studio was built at Bangkapi and the Thai Films Sound Studio at Thung Maha Mek. ...
Kuhn, A., & Westwell, G. (2020). Thailand, film in. In A Dictionary of Film Studies. Oxford University Press. Retrieved 7 Jun. 2021
In the Library Collection
This guide focuses on film-making in Thailand. Below are some of the subject headings to will help you narrow your searching.
- motion pictures asiaCall number range PN 1993.5 .A75 on Baker Stacks Level 4.
Introductory reading(s)
Apichatpong Weerasethakul by Call Number: Baker-Berry PN 1998.3 .A65 A85 2009ISBN: 9783901644313Thai filmmaker Apichatpong "Joe" Weerasethakul is widely praised as a central figure in contemporary cinema. Trained in the United States as a visual artist, Weerasethakul stunned the film world with five innovative and dreamlike features made since 2000, including such award-winning films as Blissfully Yours, Tropical Malady, and Syndromes and a Century. James Quandt, one of the foremost film critics and curators working in North America today, has edited the first English-language book on Weerasethakul. ...
Ghostly desires: queer sexuality and vernacular Buddhism in contemporary Thai cinema by Call Number: eBookISBN: 9780822361558Through an examination of post-1997 Thai cinema and video art Arnika Fuhrmann shows how vernacular Buddhist tenets, stories, and images combine with sexual politics in figuring current struggles over notions of personhood, sexuality, and collective life. The drama, horror, heritage, and experimental art films she analyzes draw on Buddhist-informed conceptions of impermanence and prominently feature the motif of the female ghost.
Thai cinema: the complete guide by Call Number: Baker-Berry PN 1993.5 .T5 T43 2018ISBN: 9781788311410One of the fastest growing and most internationally renowned cinemas in Southeast Asia is that of Thailand. In the first ever book devoted solely to this major centre of creative film-making, experts on contemporary and historic Thai film provide a timely overview and discussion of key films, directors and current movements in the region in a comprehensive encyclopaedia format. What many critics, analysts and scholars have retrospectively christened `New Thai Cinema' began to take shape in the late 1990s when national film moved away from its position as lower-class and provincial entertainment and became a firm fixture in Bangkok multiplexes and festivals worldwide. ...
Selected book title(s)
Asian cinema: a field guide by Call Number: Baker-Berry PN 1993.5 .A75 V53 2007ISBN: 9780061145858Asian cinema has never been more popular than it is today. In recent years, films such as Spirited Away, Hero, Kung Fu Hustle, and Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon have made surprising inroads into the American box office.
Asian cinemas: a reader and guide by Call Number: Baker-Berry PN 1993.5 .A75 A87 2006ISBN: 9780748617777Asian cinema is an area of increasing interest in Anglo-US film studies while Asian films are now widely distributed and popular with western audiences. The fascination with Asian cinema must be examined in the context of a complex and often problematic relationship between western scholars, students, viewers and Asian films.
Contemporary Asian cinema: popular culture in a global frame by Call Number: Baker-Berry PN 1993.5 .A75 C655 2006ISBN: 9781845202378This book presents the most authoritative assessment of contemporary Asian cinema available. Each chapter describes the cultural aspects of popular film production, analyzing key films in the context of the national, the regional and the global.
Glimpses of freedom: independent cinema in Southeast Asia by Call Number: Baker-Berry PN 1993.5 .A785 G55 2012ISBN: 9780877277552Since the late 1990s, a vivid new sphere of cinematic practice in Southeast Asia has emerged and been identified as independent. What exactly does this term mean in relation to the way films and videos are made, and the way they look?
Southeast Asian independent cinema: essays, documents, interviews by Call Number: eBookISBN: 9789888083619The rise of independent cinema in Southeast Asia, following the emergence of a new generation of filmmakers there, is among the most significant recent developments in global cinema.
Other library resource(s)
Apichatpong Weerasethakul from Oxford Bibliographies Online by Call Number: Electronic resourceISBN: 9780199791286Apichatpong Weerasethakul (b. 1970) is an independent Thai filmmaker whose Palme d’Or winning film, Uncle Boonmee Who Can Recall His Past Lives (Loong Boonmee Raluek Chat), at the 2010 Cannes Film Festival affirmed his status as an emergent Asian auteur in contemporary global art cinema. Prior to Uncle Boonmee, his feature films, Blissfully Yours (Sud Saneha) and Tropical Malady (Sat Pralat), won the Un Certain Regard award and the Jury Prize at Cannes in 2002 and 2004 respectively, denoting the filmmaker’s transnational trajectory in the processes of film production and reception. ...
Asian film online: volumes 1 & 2 by Call Number: Electronic resourceAsian Film Online offers a view of Asian culture as seen through the lens of the independent Asian filmmaker. Through a selection of over 1,000 narrative feature films, documentaries and shorts curated by film scholars and critics, the collection offers highly relevant perspectives and insights onto themes relevant across Asia, including modernity, globalization, female agency, social and political unrest, and cultural and sexual identity. ...
Finding journal articles
Articles and other writings about Thai cinema can be found in many publications. Our collection does not have any journals which look exclusively at Thai film. You can use Film & Television Literature Index to find articles or use the search box at the top of the page.
Asian cinemaCall Number: Electronic journalAsian Cinema is a seminal journal, which the Asian Cinema Studies Society has published since 1995.
Film & television literature index by Call Number: Electronic resourceUse this index to find articles about this national cinema.
Screen studies collection by Call Number: Electronic resourceA comprehensive survey of current publications related to film scholarship alongside detailed filmographies. This collection includes the FIAF International Index to Film Periodicals Database and the detailed and complementary filmographies created by the American Film Institute (AFI) and the British Film Institute.
The web of science citation databases by Call Number: Electronic resourceThe online version of 3 separate ISI indexes: Arts & Humanities Citation Index, Science Citation Index and, Social Sciences Citation Index.
Selected movie titles
Find more Thai film titles in the library's online catalog.
Dek hor = Dorm by Call Number: Streaming videoIn Thailand, the young Ton Chatree is sent to a boarding school by his father to study harder and have less entertainment with television. Once in the school, Ton feels outcast and misses his family and friends. He becomes scared with the ghost stories his new schoolmates tell about a boy that died in the swimming pool and a young pregnant woman that committed suicide.
The eye by Call Number: Jones Media DVD #3093ISBN: 9781594350085After 18 years of blindness, 20 year-old Mun's eyesight is restored following a corneal transplant. Immediately, mysterious black-clad figures in Mun's field of vision seem to foreshadow sudden deaths, and disfigured denizens haunt her daily. Mun slowly learns that she has inherited her donor's particular fate - the ability to see into the future and the terror that comes with it.
Ghost of Mae Nak by Call Number: Streaming videoA pair of young newlyweds acquire an old abandoned house in Bangkok that soon brings them into contact with Mae Nak, a vengeful spirit of horror and despair. While Mae Nak's ghost protects the couple from unscrupulous visitors, it soon becomes apparent that she expects a terrible favor in return.
P by Call Number: Streaming videoWhile growing up in rural Thailand, a young and beautiful orphan girl is taught the mysterious art of dark magic by her grandmother. When her grandmother falls sick, young Dau travels to Bangkok looking for work in order to earn enough money for medicine. She lands a job as an exotic dancer at a go-go club.
Sud sanaeha = Blissfully yours by Call Number: Jones Media DVD #10977The story of illegal Burmese immigrants and a love affair that begins during a picnic on the Thai-Burmese border.
Sˉæng satawat = Syndromes and a century by Call Number: Jones Media DVD #8278Set primarily in two hospitals, the film tells two similar stories from two different periods, mirroring their respective eras' mores. At a small-town hospital, Toa is courting charming Dr. Tei. Director Apichatpong Weerasethakul tells the story of his parents who were both doctors, and his memories about growing up in the hospital environment.
Tropical maladay by Call Number: Jones Media DVD #23260A young soldier's love affair with a young man from the country is disrupted when he disappears. Local legends claim the man was transformed into a mythic wild beast, so the soldier journeys into the heart of the Thai jungle in search of him.
