A jarringly classic Thai real-life soap
KONG RITHDEE
So has Tony Jaa become totally jarred? Is the rescuer of elephants now in need of a rescue? From himself, mostly, but maybe from his lawyers, producers, guru monks, and from the system that's sucking his soul away, too.
The bizarre episode involving the Thai martial arts wunderkind - Jaa is the bone-breaking star of the smash hit Ong-bak and Tom-Yum-Goong - has unfolded with escalating nuttiness over the past week in the Thai-language papers, which seized the opportunity to turn this purported heir to Jet Li from a ferocious fighter into a weepy soap star.
It started with the report that Jaa has gone missing from the set of the much-ballyhooed Ong-bak 2, which he both stars in and directs.
His producer claimed he couldn't reach him on the phone for nearly two months. Quickly his father came out to say that Jaa, strained from his first-time directorial outing, had gone to seek solace and new somersault tricks through meditation in the jungle.
To quell the tabloid fervour - and in the process intensifying it - Somsak Techaratanaprasert, the boss of Sahamongkol Film Intl who "discovered" and employs Jaa, held a press conference with a mixed tone of mild rebuke and imploration, claiming that Jaa had spent over 200 million baht without finishing the shoot of Ong-bak 2.
He asked the young derring-do to come out from whatever forest he was meditating in, to complete the last 20% of the film.
Three nights later, Jaa appeared on a TV talk show.
"I spent only 100 million baht, I have proof of the expense... I was stressed out and I went to a forest monastery to pray and to seek artistic visions... I make this film not for money, but for its artistic value," the son of a Surin mahout said to the camera, then he broke down in tears.
Then it went jarringly nutty. On Wednesday, Jaa's dad went to the police with the claim that his son had been abducted by a gang of mysterious men, who may or may not be involved with a Korean producer who's poaching Jaa into her agency - quite a few Korean film makers want to work with the Thai star. But of course the abduction fib was unfounded.
On Thursday, Jaa dispatched his lawyer to the Sahamongkol office, provoking a stampede of frothing journalists, and the financial negotiation between the two parties ended in bitter bickering. At one point, Jaa's lawer revealed to the astonishment of the room that his client had a "vision" that the film Ong-bak 2 would become a whopping success and score two billion baht (the first Ong-bak made 100 million, and Tom-Yum-Goong made 200 million).
Wisps of rumour also have it that Jaa's obsession with black magic and guru monks has distracted and derailed him. Yet, with or without the influence of voodooism, the nature of this conflict is not unprecedented in the heavily commercialised realm of cinema capitalism.
On the one hand is a promising star accused of being fame-drunk and greedy; on the other, we have big movie producers said to have mistreated, even exploited, their valuable human asset.
Above all, this is a classic Thai narrative of a simple rural family which suddenly becomes dysfunctional after getting a shot at wealth and heady fame.
This is totally unnecessary. Jaa is not some hotshot wannabe who was propelled to stardom by luck or a hollow marketing ploy - he is a genuine talent, a five-star Otop actor from a humble Surin village, now exportable throughout the globe. He is the first Siamese actor in our history whose mere name is enough to sell movies to international distributors. Tom-Yum-Goong made 200 million baht in Thailand, but its worldwide box-office receipts - it was released in the US as well as a dozen other countries - exceeded $25 million. And the man has got this far because of his hard work and dedication. He must not waste it, and it would be a shame if his producers are not generous enough to see this complication through with complete sincerity.
It's crucial that his producers not regard Jaa simply as a product - that's so Hollywood! - but as a person. Most importantly, though, Jaa must not allow himself to believe that he is a product - a money-spinning machine for himself and the people he works for. What he's been doing on-screen, his balletic grace and gymnastic genius in the orchestration of cinematic combat, is the honour of Thai cinema, a national treasure even. It'd be such a stupid anti-climax if he lets it all fall apart because of his own undoing. Meditation sure helps, but not always.
