| |
 |
I love tango. I don’t really know where my obsession started but I think it dates back to the first time I saw Wong Kar-wei’s 1997 film, Happy Together. Originally I was a very shy and timid girl. But my love of tango pushed me into a bit of craziness – wandering the city to find a trainer. I soon dropped the idea, deciding that my plumpness would completely detract from the glamorous steps.
But my enthusiasm for tango was renewed when I saw the trailer of Kittikorn Leokitikornsakul’s latest work The Bullet Wives. My dream shone brighter than ever. The Bullet Wives looked like it could be the coolest looking flick I had seen in recent years. A bunch of top Thai models and stars march together in leather jackets, tight pants, colorful and sexy bikini-line tops, as well as high-cut boots. They carry various types of guns, sometimes with two hands, open reckless shootings, and then they move in stylistic tango and slow-motion mix. My Chow Yun-fat’s supercool gunshooting tactics in John Woo’s Hong Kong movies are explicitly borrowed by my Thai female idols – though sometimes in awkward moves. The director’s intentional settings are nice and colorful locations and could serve very well for a woman’s film. The Bullet Wives combines everything I love – cool costume, nice locations, major female roles, and, most importantly, tango! It has all the potential to make my top-ten favorite films. But sorry! It did not make it!
Tango sequences are too few - only five in total, and only one in the whole gunfire battle. The choreography should highlight the beauty and glamorous looks of my models and stars. But it does not. Instead, they look funny in those awkward gunshooting and dance sequences – perhaps too little training time. So after half an hour, I started to look at my watch every five minutes. My feminist chemistry always blocks me to like this kind of themes. The Bullet Wives employs the popular TV-series theme, mia noi-mia luang, (literally means mistress and the first wife) as they fight over the same man via a gangster paradigm. Two groups of women, with the ridiculous names, First Class Wife International and Economy Wife International, declare a war in order to get hold of each party’s rights and, most importantly, a longer or even permanent stay with their husband.
The director clearly played down men’s roles. Only two weak husbands are seen throughout. Other male characters include two young bad guys who are treated like dogs, as they are always ready to double-cross each other for money. But all the conflict arises from these women’s fight to claim their men. Why so? It should be those dishonest husbands who are killed, not first wives or mistresses.
This leaves the spectacular tango and action sequences as the only aspects of the film that might be enjoyable. But they are so few and so poor that it makes no difference to watch or walk out of this movie.
All Rights Reserved.
|
