January 15, 2005

Dear Diary: Today was my villiage's worst day ever!

(Posted In)

Born-to-Fight.jpgI am at Todd's right now and I have just been witness to another unholy onslaught of Thai action violence thanks to part of the team that brought you the Muay Thai actioner Ong Bak.

Born to Fight comes with a slight reversal in roles; the action director from Ong Bak, Panna Rittikrai, took the reigns and wrote and directed the movie. Prachya Pinkaew, Ong Bak's director, produced. The story is simple. Athletes with good hearts attempt to bring a little cheer to an impovrished villiage the same day it is targeted by insurgents bent on freeing one of their own from captivity. Insurgents take over village, slaughter half the village, athletes and villagers rise up and take back the village. Simple and to the point. So how is it?

Sweet merciful crap! What do they put in their Corn Flakes over in Thailand? What makes them get up in the morning and say to themselves, "Alright! Today I get to ride my motorcycle full speed into a few cords of wood and fly through the burning frame of what could have been a house!" It hurts just to watch it. The stunts are beyond description. You wonder how anyone is alive and you begin to believe that the planets do align in your favor and you can escape death that day.

What was also fun was while watching the movie we made mental notes of possible homages. Note that if you knew what inspired Rittikrai or what he was watching while writing this movie the list would look sort of like this: Die Hard, Police Story, Armageddon, Hard Boiled and The Killer to name a few. And yet when you see these they are done in their own way with their own 'Thai' spin that you wouldn't even mind if you found out they were directly lifted for some of the stunts and scenes.

A while back one of our faithful readers made a playful shot that we only 'dig pretentious crap'. And while we certainly don't ever feel the need to defend ourselves to such claims Born to Fight certainly doesn't come close to filling that description. Is it heavy in plot? Nope. Does it make any sense? Nope. Is it at all plausible? Not bloody likely. Is it a lot of fun to watch? HELL. YES.

How does it compare to Ong Bak? It comes close. It's not as good as Ong Bak but man does it make you hoot and hollar. Right now it's only available on Thai VCD format without english subtitles. So while we don't know what they're saying you get the jist of it. And since the second half of the movie is non-stop action and stuntwork dialogue is not a high priority. However, we are aware that Born to Fight is supposedly being made available in R2 format in the UK in May. But we'll keep you posted on that as news comes up. In the meantime, the VCD will be travelling tonight to our webmonkey's house for another viewing.

» Posted by Mack at January 15, 2005 10:25 PM
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Reader Comments

It's "homages" when you like the movie. It's "plagiarism" when you don't. What a dumb movie. Goes to show you guys will like anything as long as its "foreign", even if it's the dumbest, most mindless crap like this movie.

» Posted by whatever at January 16, 2005 03:38 AM

i read somewhere yesterday that the UK will get "born to fight" from momentum asia on may 23rd 2005... original language with english subtitles etc... cant find any solid info on that...

» Posted by logboy at January 16, 2005 05:43 AM

We actually brought that up ourselves back in November ... original entry is here pointing to a press release here.

» Posted by Todd at January 16, 2005 10:02 AM

"Dig pretentious crap? Hehe...yeah that was me. I'm glad you said "playful shot," because I was being playful. You see, I'm a playful wind (wink wink). Anyway, you frigg'n convinced me. I'm going to just order the VCD because we all know the Thai DVD will never come...and I can't wait til May to see this. It's just too bad it's fullscreen, but if you guys are this hot over it, it's gotta be cool. I'm jonesing for cool, real stunts and hard-hitting action.

And to this "whatever" guy...what's your problem?

» Posted by crazybee at January 16, 2005 07:45 PM

Whatever: it's plagiarism if you go shot for shot. It's an homage if you take a concept and put your own spin on it. This film definitely goes through door number two. And the LARGE majority of stunt sequences are completely original.

Bee: good choice. There's one money shot hurt by the crop but this thing is well worth the six bucks ... the entire second disc is just jaw dropping ... once things get rolling it doesn't let up for a minute ... and does being a playful wind help you out with the ladies? 'Cause what I'm doing now aint workin' ...

» Posted by Todd at January 16, 2005 09:05 PM

Momentum asia are releasing this on DVD in March, they are the new division of Miramax, or Miramaxe as I like to call them, did you see what they did to fist of legend and shaolin soccer?! Anyways, it looks like at least twenty minutes will be cut, and it will be re edited. I havent been able to locate a region 3 release date for the DVD, help with this would be very much appreciated. I do know the VCD is still floating about, but it was re-released in thai cinemas, so the DVD has been held back, like with Kung Fu Hustle, the company recently asked cdwow to take it off the website as it was still in cinemas, but its defo out on the 25th Feb.

L8r

» Posted by Chris at February 10, 2005 07:32 AM

And to Whatever, why do you come in to this site and read reviews if yo dont like them and totally disagree with them, do you self harm my good man?

» Posted by Chris at February 10, 2005 08:08 AM

Thai DVD just release a week ago. No Subtitles but they put some of special features like stunt works instead.

» Posted by OldPoem at March 19, 2005 12:09 AM

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