Apichatpong Weerasethakul: interview

Apichatpong Weerasethakul makes films that are light on narrative. But, as he shows Ben Walters, he has clear opinions on everything from censorship to profligate camera movement

There’s a scene in ‘Syndromes and a Century’ – the latest feature from Thailand’s master of the everyday sublime, Apichatpong Weerasethakul – in which two characters contemplate an orchid. ‘It seems to lack form and order,’ one says to the other; but it is, of course, a thing of beauty. Something similar could be said about the films of Apichatpong (who also goes by the Euro-friendly tag of ‘Joe’). Languorous and mesmeric, they’re short on conventional narrative and action, and can be frustrating to audiences expecting those elements. Apichatpong concentrates instead on things like the play of sunlight on water, the nuances of emotional exchange, the way cinematic practice can approximate the operation of memory. Take his sensual, rhythmic, world-loving films on their own terms and you’ll be transported.

His titles offer clues to his sensibility: ‘Mysterious Object at Noon’ (2000) was a semi-documentary story-game shot in backwoods Thailand; ‘Blissfully Yours’ (2002) set a slow-motion love triangle against the twin backdrops of bureaucracy and the river; and ‘Tropical Malady’ (2004) offered gay love, shape-shifting spirits, soldiers and tigers deep in the forest. (There’s also 2003’s ‘The Adventure of Iron Pussy’, a sort of transsexual ‘Modesty Blaise’ which pays lurid tribute to the Thai pop culture that only tangentially seasons Apichatpong’s other pictures.)

All these, along with a selection of shorts, can be seen at a BFI Southbank season running in tandem with the release of ‘Syndromes…’. Like
‘Blissfully Yours’ and ‘Tropical Malady’, his latest film is a reverie in two parts, each subtly reworking, challenging and reinforcing the other. (Apichatpong, a student of Buddhism, has compared the technique to reincarnation.) In this instance the settings are hospitals – one rural and low-tech, the other urban and modern – and the main characters are based on the director’s parents, both of whom were doctors.
‘It’s not really a biography in the classical sense,’ Apichatpong explains on the phone from Bangkok. ‘It’s more a mixture of things: your present and your past, the overheard story and the contemporary one that I’m living. It’s a mixture of these memories.’ Many of these memories are first-hand: as a boy, much of Apichatpong’s time was spent in the hospital of his home village in north-east Thailand.

‘Back then it was different. The hospital life was in the tradition of the old and the new, so some parts were made of wood and some parts were concrete. And the system was not as efficient as today. Villagers would have to wait a long time, maybe more than a day, so they would hang around, look at the pond in the centre of the hospital, stay the night. I remember waiting for my mother every lunchtime, waiting in her room before she finished her work.’ How did you feel when you were waiting? ‘I think I was happy. I was happy just being in that environment. It’s like a temple; it’s very calm and cool, and it doesn’t smell.’

The director’s father has died, but his mother is alive. Has she seen this sort-of portrait of her own early years? ‘Not yet. Actually, she’s not so interested in watching my kind of film. She’s very content with everyday life. She’d prefer to watch soap opera and she’s always wondering when I’m going to make a comedy or something with a happy ending.’

The ending of ‘Syndromes…’ is pretty happy – ecstatic even, in its strange way – but you couldn’t call it soapy. In fact, Apichatpong was wary even about letting his camera move, a departure from his usual practice he brought in by having it prowl the hospital corridors in the film’s second part. Compared to the rural scenes, he notes, ‘the architecture is more enclosed and the way to show this was to move the camera, so automatically the dolly had to come in. I was not really used to camera movement. I was worried that it would be too commercial; I think some people move the camera a lot to get the audience’s attention. For me that’s my big concern, that the style will destroy the emotion.’

There’s no danger of that, but ‘Syndromes…’ has attracted undesirable attention. Because of its scenes of monks playing guitar and playing with kites, and doctors drinking alcohol and getting aroused, it has been denied certification in Thailand and remains officially unseen there. In response, Apitchatpong started an online petition encouraging the military government to rethink its policies (it has attracted over 7,000 signatures so far) and issued a statement commending his films to the international community.

Some have suggested a stronger response might have been in order. ‘We don’t have the nature of the West where people go out on the street and protest,’ Apichatpong notes. ‘If French people lived here there would be non-stop protests on the streets every day. But here it is quite different.’ He recognises, however, that his is a privileged position. ‘In my case it’s easy [to appeal to an international audience], but for young people it’s quite difficult. I was just trying to encourage them to keep on doing what they’re doing because with this episode of censorship they kind of hesitate.’

Such oppression can, however, have fruitful consequences. ‘The military government are very imposing of their opinions, their morals and their values, so it creates this question for you of what it means to be human and what your rights are. It’s really inspiring you in a way to make art, to write, to make films, because you live in such a wonderful country and at the same time it’s so ugly.’

‘Syndromes and a Century’ is out this Friday. The Apichatpong Weerasethakul season runs at BFI Southbank Sept 21-30.