As an editor, Lee Chatametikool has acquired the reputation of being a kind of doctor, the way you also have script doctors: someone who can get good stories that have foundered back on track and who doesn’t just heal but also improves. He has also released those magic healing powers in his feature debut as a director. A widely branching and layered story acquires an almost lighthearted form. Two time periods are flexibly interwoven. The film focuses on two brothers in Bangkok in 1997, the year when the Asian economy collapsed. But the childhood and school years of the brothers are just as important for the mood of the story. The filmmaker evokes the mood cleverly by reconstructing complete television and music shows from the period with his actors in the leading roles. The elder brother returns from New York to Bangkok after the father has committed suicide because of the crisis. He has to clear up the financial situation in the family company and look after his younger brother. Both brothers cherished a puppy love and this evokes yet other crises. This unusual and complex debut probably can’t be described as autobiographical, but Chatametikool did introduce his personal experiences as well: just like his protagonist, he moved between two cultures: America and Thailand.
