MFF2007: Syndromes and a Century

Directed by Apichatpong Weerasethakul

With Nantarat Sawaddikul, Nu Nimsomboon, Sophon Pukanok

Website at www.strandreleasing.com

The film begins decades ago in rural Thailand, where a pair of young doctors (inspired by the director’s parents’ own story of meeting) hesitantly embark upon a cautious love affair. The romance and humor here are genuine, and will strike a chord with fans of the stylishly shy courtships in the work of Wong Kar-wai. Before long however, this gentle starting point diabolically folds in upon itself, yielding to stories-within-stories, a modern retelling of the original courtship in a sterile Bangkok hospital, and, eventually, a stream of haunting sci-fi imagery worthy of Kubrick’s 2001 and Antonioni’s Eclipse. (from the filmfest-guide)

Hm.. No, I think describing it as a “stream of haunting sci-fi imagery worthy of Kubrick’s 2001” may be very unfortunate and misleading, because there is no haunting sci-fi imagery, there are no spaceships, apes, bones, monoliths, eerie sounds, psychedelic journeys, retro-futuristic furniture or other sci-fi visions. The only thing 2001 and Syndromes and a Century may have in common is perhaps the way how different passages in time were weaved together with a matching element. In the famous 2001 scene Stanley Kubrick links the dawn of mankind with the modern age of space exploration by throwing a bone into the air which in the next scene becomes a spaceship of similar shape. In Syndromes and a Century two different points in time are elegantly and carefully woven together by using common or similar colors, situations and dialog sequences. However, it still feels like a bit of a stretch to mention Kubrick in a sentence about Syndromes and a Century. This film deserves to be recognized as a quite unique piece of filmmaking.

Syndromes and a Century is a film about the director’s parents who were both doctors and his memories about growing up in the hospital environment. It is set in two parts. The first part focuses on a female doctor set in a not so distant past of perhaps the 60s or 70s. The second part focuses on a male doctor and is set in a more contemporary hospital environment. This film has no traditional story line from beginning to end. It is a composition of impressions, pictures, memories, everyday life moments, fragments, “syndromes and peals of wisdom”. Just like real memories, these impressions may overlap throughout very different times and situations, they may appear connected and common, or disconnected and unique, or unknowingly familiar deja-vu experiences.

This film was composed very carefully with a close attention to time, pace, dialog, colors, as well as the environment and architecture with its natural but also sterile, personal or majestic proportions. The result was a very personal, quiet, shy, fragile, charming, extremely beautiful and innocent journey I thought was very refreshing and should be treated very softly. Syndromes and a Century is another of my festival-favorites this year.