At first, Apichatpong Weerasethakul's murky art movie Tropical Malady is about a romance between a young Thai soldier and a country boy. Then the boy disappears — perhaps he has been transformed into a magical beast — and things change for the even more mythic as the soldier pushes into the heart of the jungle in pursuit. There is no loss of art-movie face to be had, I assure you, in admitting difficulty with the filmmaker's intentional tangle of genres as he stakes his story between waking life and legend: It took me two viewings to enjoy the landscape of Weerasethakul's mysterious jungle — so very thick, steamy, and foreign — without wishing for clearer trail markers.
THREE TIMES A 'MALADY' In the jungle, the mighty jungle, a pair of lovers unite
EW's GRADE
BDetails Limited Release: Jun 29, 2005; Length: 120 Minutes; Genres: Drama, Foreign Language; With: Sakda Kaewbuadee and Banlop Lomnoi; Distributor: Strand Releasing
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