Scenes from the subconscious

Apichatpong Weerasethakul’s Palme d’Or-winning Uncle Boonmee Who Can Recall His Past Lives is a fascinating puzzleApichatpong Weerasethakul’s Palme d’Or-winning Uncle Boonmee Who Can Recall His Past Lives is a fascinating puzzle

SURREAL DEAL: Uncle Boonmee Who Can Recall His Past Lives

If you were at all familiar with the work of Thai director Apichatpong Weerasethakul, you were probably elated when he won the Palme d’Or

at Cannes this year for his new film, Uncle Boonmee Who Can Recall His Past Lives. Weerasethakul is one of the strangest, funniest and most brilliant talents in world cinema right now, and the recognition was welcome, if unexpected. Not to say a little controversial; some people will nev­er get Weerasethakul’s abstract narratives and I can think of one Toronto writer in particular whose printed reaction was shamefully small-mind­ed and condescending.

Uncle Boonmee is a little less accessible than Weerasethakul’s last feature, the brilliant Syndromes and a Century, though it’s far from being cryptic or challenging. His movies are inviting and playful, even if they don’t deal with linear narratives. The man is, it must be said, a surre­alist in the original sense of the word, summoning up images and scenes from his subconscious and staging them with gorgeous precision and wit.

The film tells the story, if you can call it that, of the uncle of the title (Thanapat Saisaymar), who is dying from an unspecified organ disease. There are hints of a dark past, spent killing Communists (the area of Thailand where the film takes place was the site of some very bloody con­flict, which Weerasethakul has explored before). He’s visited by ghosts; by spectral, red-eyed monkeys. In what may be his past life, a catfish seduces a princess. The film shifts between styles, giving it an episodic, somewhat disjointed feel.

I can’t tell you what it means, only what it hints at: regret, loss, some intangible sense of the supernatural. Some of its images, like the scene in the cave, are indelible. It’s one of the finest movies I’ve seen this year, but you’re going to have to go in prepared for a non-linear narrative. If you’re open to it, this movie is awesome. Nobody is making films like Weerasethakul now. He has this sense of complete creative freedom and confidence, like a conjurer, and yet his movies are the furthest thing from aggressive or intimidating. He is a puzzle, alluring, fascinating and endlessly worth watching. ■

UNCLE BOONMEE WHO CAN RECALL HIS PAST LIVES OPENS THIS FRIDAY, NOV. 26 AT THE CINÉMA DU PARC

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