Want to try watching an Indian movie but don’t quite know where to start? Now’s your chance with the Indian Film Festival of Thailand, where you can relive Bollywood’s biggest blockbusters for 150 baht per movie, as opposed to the 350 baht that the tickets usually cost on regular release. Perhaps better retitled the Deepika Padukone Film Festival of Thailand (she’s in three of the seven films showing), some of the most popular movies from India’s Tinseltown within the past three years will be showing at Paragon Cineplex from Aug 22-28. In this event hosted by MVP Entertainment, Zee Entertainment and Siam Paragon, the festival’s opening will also see flash mob dances and interviews with Thai stuntmen who have worked in Bollywood. Prangthong Jitcharoenkul, author of India Mee Arai Ja Bok, will also be sharing her experiences while studying in India.
Photo courtesy of MVP Entertainment
A good selection of historical epics, masalas (an Indian genre that mixes action, comedy, romance and melodrama all in one) and comedy-dramas will be showing every night at 7.30pm. All movies feature soundtracks with both English and Thai subtitles.
On Aug 22, the festival kicks off with a film starring Padukone called Chennai Express, where she and Bollywood king Shahrukh Khan must escape mafia goons down in the south of the subcontinent. If you’re not too much of a song and dance fan, the films showing on 23-24, PK and Piku respectively, offer a less “filmi” vibe, with contemporary characters and plot lines.
On Thai shores, PK is one of the most well-received movies, which follows the story of an alien who gets stranded on earth and tries to understand different religions. We see Padukone in Piku again, in a tale of a taxi driver who is stuck with driving a dysfunctional father-daughter pair to Calcutta.
But to get a real feel of what the glitz of Bollywood is all about, go for any of the films showing from Aug 25-28. On the 25th there’s Dilwale and 26th Bajrangi Bhaijaan. Both are set in the modern day, but are filled with high-octane action scenes and dance numbers that probably cost more than the average Thai movie’s budget. If you’re looking for a feast for the eyes, the festival closes off with historical epics: Bajirao Mastani on the 27th and Bahubali on the last day. Starring opposite of her real life beau Ranveer Singh, Padukone plays Mastani, a Muslim princess based on a real figure from the early 18th century. It’s a love story of majestic proportions, with magnificent sets and costumes that will make your jaw drop. There’s more war scenes in the other period film Bahubali, but in no way are there any less visual effects and stunning cinematography.
This source first appeared on Bangkok Post Lifestyle.