Horror is a film genre that seeks to elicit fear or disgust in its audience for entertainment purposes.
Nang Nak is a 1999 Thai supernatural horror film based on the Thai legend of Mae Nak Phra Khanong. It was directed by Nonzee Nimibutr and released in 1999 by Buddy Film and Video Production Co. in Thailand. It depicts the life of a devoted ghost wife and her unsuspecting husband.
Mae Nak Phra Khanong, or simply Mae Nak or Nang Nak, is a well-known Thai ghost. According to local folklore the story is based on events that took place during the reign of King Rama IV.
Sombat Metanee was a Thai actor and film director, who was honored as National Artist in the performing arts branch in 2016.
The cinema of Thailand dates back to the early days of filmmaking, when King Chulalongkorn's 1897 visit to Bern, Switzerland was recorded by François-Henri Lavancy-Clarke. The film was then brought to Bangkok, where it was exhibited. This sparked more interest in film by the Thai Royal Family and local businessmen, who brought in filmmaking equipment and started to exhibit foreign films. By the 1920s, a local film industry was started and in the 1930s, the Thai film industry had its first "golden age", with a number of studios producing films.
Yuthlert Sippapak is a Thai film director, screenwriter and producer. He is best known for his genre-blending films Killer Tattoo and Buppah Rahtree.
The Krasue is a nocturnal female spirit of Southeast Asian folklore. It manifests as the floating, disembodied head of a woman, usually young and beautiful, with her internal organs still attached and trailing down from the neck.
Buppah Rahtree is a 2003 Thai comedy-horror film written and directed by Yuthlert Sippapak. With its comic references to The Exorcist and Audition, Buppah Rahtree gained a cult following through screenings at the 2004 Toronto International Film Festival and the Fantasia Festival. Its sequels are Buppah Rahtree Phase 2: Rahtree Returns (2005), Rahtree Reborn (2009) and Rahtree Revenge (2009).
Ghost of Mae Nak is a 2005 Thai horror film thriller about a protecting ghost directed and written by British director Mark Duffield. The film stars Pataratida Pacharawirapong, Siwat Chotchaicharin and Porntip Papanai as the ghost.
Bangjong Pisanthanakun is a Thai filmmaker and screenwriter. He saw early success with his first two films, Shutter (2004) and Alone (2007), both horror films that he co-directed and co-wrote with Parkpoom Wongpoom. He also directed the 2013 comedy horror romance film Pee Mak, which became Thailand's highest-grossing film of all time, and the 2021 horror film The Medium, which was a commercial and critical success in South Korea. In addition to horror films, Bangjong directed the romance films Hello Stranger (2010) and One Day (2016).
Parkpoom Wongpoom is a Thai filmmaker and screenwriter. He is best known for his work with filmmaker Banjong Pisanthanakun, and the two co-directed and co-wrote the hit 2004 Thai horror film, Shutter, and the 2007 horror film, Alone.
Laila Boonyasak, or formerly Chermarn Boonyasak, nickname Ploy, is a Thai film and television actress and model. She is well known for her role as June/Tang in the movie The Love of Siam. Her other film roles have included the title ghost character in director Yuthlert Sippapak's horror-comedies Buppah Rahtree and Buppah Rahtree Phase 2: Rahtree Returns. She was also featured in Pen-Ek Ratanaruang's Last Life in the Universe, in which she portrayed the younger sister of the character played by her real-life older sister, Daran Boonyasak.
Rahtree Reborn is a 2009 Thai comedy-horror film written and directed by Yuthlert Sippapak. It is a sequel to the 2005 film, Buppah Rahtree Phase 2: Rahtree Returns.
Pop is a cannibalistic spirit of Thai folklore. It manifests itself as a creature that likes to devour human viscera. Pop is related to the Phi Fa spirit.
Phi Tai Hong is a ghost of Thai folklore. It is the vengeful and restless spirit of a person who suddenly suffered a violent or cruel death.
Nak is a Thai animated dark fantasy horror film that was released on April 3, 2008 and aired on TV in Thai PBS Kids.
Belief in ghosts in Thai culture is both popular and enduring. In the history of Thailand, Buddhist popular beliefs intermingled with legends of spirits or ghosts of local folklore. These myths have survived and evolved, having been adapted to the modern media, such as Thai films, Thai television soap operas, and Thai comics.
Pee Mak is a 2013 Thai supernatural romantic comedy-horror film directed by Banjong Pisanthanakun. The story is an adaptation of the Mae Nak Phra Khanong legend of Thai folklore. It was released on 28 March 2013. The film stars Mario Maurer as Mak and Davika Hoorne as Nak, and Pongsathorn Jongwilas, Nattapong Chartpong, Auttarut Kongrasri and Kantapat Permpoonpatcharasook. The film was a major commercial success upon its release and became Thailand's highest grossing-film of all time.
Thai queer cinema is a category of Thai films that in some way represent non-normative gender and sexuality. In other words, the narratives explored in Thai queer cinema go beyond heterosexual relationships and the male-female gender binary. The classification of this genre of Thai film as "queer" rather than LGBT, is used by film scholars, Brett Farmer, Oradol Kaewprasert, Karl Schoonover, and Rosalind Galt, in an effort to fully capture the range of Thai gender and sexuality, or phet portrayed in film which may not be accurately represented through Western LGBT terminology.
Santi-Vina is a 1954 Thai Bildungsroman film. It was produced by Ratana Pestonji and Robert G. North, with American sponsorship, and won major awards at the Asia Pacific Film Festival in Tokyo. Widely regarded as a classic, it was the first Thai film to be shot in 35-mm color, but was considered lost until its rediscovery in 2014 and subsequent restoration.
