Stories from the North

A loving and utterly beautiful documentary portrait of Chiang Rai, the district in the north of Thailand where the film maker himself grew up. The film is made up of eight (or nine if you count a half as a whole) more or less independent chapters, some of which were made and screened as separate short films. For instance the chapter The Way was shot last year as a short film during the festival. And the first chapter, March of Time, was also Raksasad’s graduation film.
Each chapter features different people and a different story. Children who tell ghost stories, a man looking after his water buffalo, an old woman longing for death. Life stories, but also mythical tales about ghosts and told as true; the film maker does not seem to have any reason not to believe them.
The film is obviously about time past. And even if traditions still retained their position in this region, it is clear to see – through the lack of young people – that there is little future for the past. So the film is not only about the people and the rice paddies now, but also about the memories of the film maker, making the film less realistic than it sometimes looks. The agricultural life in the villages of Lanna (which stands for a million rice paddies) is recorded by the film maker before it disappears. Nostalgic beauty. (GjZ)