Review: Citizen Dog (2005)

                           CITIZEN DOG
               (a film review by Mark R. Leeper)

    CAPSULE: Thai writer-director Wisit Sasanatieng
    adapts the farcical novel by Koynuch.  The story
    is a chain of strange events and ideas.  The
    ideas are like happy people have tails and Teddy
    bears smoke cigarettes.  This all probably works
    better in Thailand than in this translation.
    Rating: 0 (-4 to +4) or 4/10

Comedies of the silent era, the ones featuring the likes of
Buster Keaton and Charlie Chaplin were more universal because
they were more visual and did not rely on words.  I don't imagine
Monsieur Hulot loses much when his films are shown in the US.
Humor is a very delicate thing.  Even within a single language
what is funny to one person will not be to another.  One man's
laugh riot is another man's Adam Sandler.  Wit is even more
perishable when translated into other languages.  It frequently
does not survive the transition gracefully.  One finds little
uproarious in the English translations of CANDIDE, for example.
It is hard to imagine that the radio version of "The Hitchhiker's
Guide to the Galaxy" would have the same nuances in some other
language.  On the other hand apparently Jerry Lewis comedies get
something of a comic boost when translated into French.

It is easy to imagine the humor of CITIZEN DOG played well in
Thailand.  It seems like a sort of conflation of a number of
farcical premises that easily could be funny.  But it has serious
problems crossing the language barrier.  Having a character
believe the weird idea that all happy people have tails and later
finding out it is perfectly true is a concept.  Handled properly
it might be funny.  But the handling is done by a translator who
gets the idea across but very probably not the all-important
tone.  It is about as funny as telling someone that two men hide
from the Mafia by dressing as women and playing in an all-girl
band.

The main character is a sort of naïve country boy not unlike
Candide.  Mahasamut Boonyaruk plays Pod who escapes his difficult
rustic life to come to the city.  In Bangkok he works in a
sardine factory.  Life would be bad enough there but a less-
tragic-than-you-might-think accident happens and he loses his
finger.  Somewhere in Thailand there is a can of sardines with
Pod's finger and he sets out to find it.  There he meets and
loves Jin (played by Saengthong Gate-Uthong).  Jin is a rabid
book-reader who tells Pad that you know which people are happy
because happy people have tails.  Jin's Bangkok is a much
stranger city than the real Bangkok, though at least in this
version is not really any more interesting.  Jin is an
environmental activist.

The film is complete with strange musical numbers.  The
cinematography by Rewat Prelert heavily distorts the color.  The
script by Wisit Sasanatieng is full of little bizarre digressions
much in the style of AMELIE.  There are several irritatingly
noticeable product placements, signs for a well-known Thai brand
of beer.  Wisit Sasanatieng, whose only other film is the popular
TEARS OF THE BLACK TIGER, directed the film.  Amusing, perhaps,
but not funny.  CITIZEN DOG (MAH NAKORN) rates a 0 on the -4 to
+4 scale or 4/10.

					Mark R. Leeper
					mleeper@xxxxxxxxxxxxx
					Copyright 2005 Mark R. Leeper

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