Stumbled on Vinyan at the local rental house a few weeks ago in the new releases section. Lurid cover, just enough to make me peek at the liner notes. I thought, aside from the award winning/festival playing pedigree stamp on the face, that it might just be another one of those wonderful time waster horror films that I've stumbled on and viewed over the last couple of days. But you see, I should have looked back in time into my repetoire of foreign thrillers and known that it wasn't going to be some direct to video rip off. I looked at it and set it down, didn't deem it worthy of my time. I didn't have faith, that's all there is to it.
So, I stumbled upon Vinyan again last week. Yet another brick and mortar joint was closing out it's stock, shuttering it's doors, all that. Two copies for sale on the shelf. Then I thought, man, why should I buy it when I can rent it? I mean, if all I'm going to do is be disappointed why have it at home collecting dust? What a silly man I was, let me tell you, for having let it go. Borrowed it, waited for sundown, got in a bit of supper, a bit of vino and plugged it in. From the moment it started out I knew I was treading dangerous waters. The whole story was about dangerous waters, tsunamis, lost children, a mother's love for her swept away child, all that. A wretched, dangerous sort of sadness.
The story revolves around a wealthy couple who lack closure after the 2005 Indian Ocean tidal wave washes away their kid out to sea. Mom never really recovers, thinks she sees her boy in an newsreel video snapped by an wanderlust type in a sea gypsy village on the Thai/Burma border. Against all reason her husband bankrolls the venture to find the boy, hires underworld thugs to get him and the wife to the village where the boy was last seen. Add one leaky craft, a lot of mystical mumbo jumbo about angry souls, a large dollop of very wet, very nasty jungle and you have the makings of one very paranoid and scary bit of movie watching. I wasn't freaked out in the way that American horror films might have made me. There were no outrageous startling moments, nothing untoward jumping out at me for the sake of making me jump. Just a bunch of wicked looking feral children doing their Lord of the Flies best to freak me out. I was practically on my knees thanking god for travel videos and for a lack of a major travel jones.
As much as I would just love to see Thailand again, do the Pattaya Beach thing again, indulge in a lot of their local ganja, great food, wonderful surf, all that, I think I'll have to pass, that is, until they do something about that feral child population. It's a long ways to go just to have your bride wisked off into the wilds to be some Lost Boys wannabes. I like my gal just fine, let them find someone else to be their new Mama of the Week.
Wild film, wicked drama. Unsettling, nerve wracking, worthy of your time just for the sake of the Bangkok side of the travelogue. But let me add that it was tough watching the sheer madness and folly of a mother's broken heart unfold on the screen. Four of out five stars...er..scares! Watch it before you go!
Action!
Movie Review: Vinyan:
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