You won't be disappointed!

Pretty Good

It's fun, it's light, [but] it has a hard time when its tries to get heavy.

This is one of the best movies I’ve seen in a very long time. You have to go and see this on the big screen.

Westerns have never really been my cup of tea, I usually feel bored or I just turn them off. However, this Thai western was awesome. There's a good amount of comedy, heart and violence. I never thought I'd be seeing a western from Thailand, but maybe that's what made it better for me. This one is big time fun.The filming and camera work both seem very amateurish and it takes away from the experience a bit, which is the reason I didn't give this movie a 9. The acting is a little iffy at times but good for the most part. Everything else is great, the comedy, the romance and most of all, the bloody violence! See it now or I'll come to your house!

Thai filmmakers are making some great inroads, and TEARS OF THE BLACK TIGER is a prime example thereof. The storyline, which owes as much to Sergio Leone's spaghetti westerns as anything else, is all over the road- intentionally. I couldn't help but laugh out loud at some of the over-the-top shenanigans. All done with a straight face. (And funny in their own special way, too; not as in-your-face as, say, guilty pleasures like TOP SECRET! or REVENGE OF THE NERDS II, but not totally removed, either.) The "old school cinema" look was ideal- and inspired. Something old and something new going on, here. If you're a true lover of cinema, I highly recommend TEARS OF THE BLACK TIGER.

In this age in which just about every other film seems to be a sequel, adaptation or remake of a previous work, it seems positively ungrateful and counterproductive to criticize a movie for being TOO innovative and creative - yet that is exactly the case with "Tears of the Black Tiger," a movie that is a mixture of so many different genres and styles that it is virtually impossible to explain what it is like to anyone who hasn't actually seen it.Indeed, if the term, in and of itself, were not self-contradictory and meaningless, one might be tempted to call "Tears" a "Chinese Italian Western," seeing as it draws much of its look and style from those "spaghetti westerns" Clint Eastwood made his name with in the 1960's: "A Fistful of Dollars, "For a Few Dollars More" and "The Good, the Bad and the Ugly." Yet, that would be an inadequate description of "Tears of the Black Tiger" as well, since the movie also looks like one of those glossy 1950's melodramas by Douglas Sirk, on the order of "Magnificent Obsession," "Imitation of Life," and "All That Heaven Allows" (albeit with an all Chinese cast). It certainly makes for a bizarre hybrid, to say the least, but, despite its originality, this tale of an unlikely romance between a gun slinging outlaw (the Black Tiger) and a classy beauty from the upper classes - who seem to be inhabiting entirely different centuries, let alone entirely different parts of the world - fails to ignite much interest in the viewer.With its cartoon-like violence, highly stylized settings, arch acting and corny dialogue, the film is obviously intended to be an affectionate send-up of the kind of escapist, popcorn movies Hollywood has been exporting to the world for nearly a century now. But the movie is too strained to be truly funny, too artificial to be truly involving, with its jumbled, out-of-chronological-order narrative structure finally frustrating the viewer past the point of caring. The bold, garish colors add to the film's air of surrealism, but most people will probably weary of the movie once the novelty of the concept has worn off."Tears of the Black Tiger" is a film one would like to support and admire, but the sad truth is that, in this case at least, the filmmakers were not able to pull the thing off. "Tears of the Black Tiger," for all its goodwill and craftsmanship, earns an "A" for effort, but a mere "Gentleman's C-" for the product overall.

I've borrowed this DVD from the library twice before, but never had the chance to watch it, until now. The appeal is actually to see some of Thai director Wisit Sasanatieng's past works, before his up and coming made-in-Singapore flick called Armful. And I've heard some good things about this movie too.The story combines two different genres into one, the first being a cowboy western, (set in Thailand no less!) and the usual star-crossed lover romance. Perhaps the novelty of the first genre type is having Thai folks dress up as cowboys, riding on their steed and somehow, becoming the villains as they plunder and kill. Yup, they're not the good guys, against the usual stereotype. Here, the cowboys are bandits, and the good folks are naturally, the cops.But amongst all the bad hats (pardon the pun), there's always the hero who's forced by circumstances to join the group. Dum (Chartchai Ngamsan), also known as the notorious Black Tiger, renowned fastest and deadliest draw in all of Thailand, has a childhood sweetheart in Rumpoey (Sttella Malucchi). However, their difference in status (he's the son of a servant, while she, the daughter of the governor) meant that it's a forbidden romance to begin with. Knowing his place in her world, he could only admire from afar, becoming her protector, shielding her from harm (like numerous approaches by lechers and bandits).A man gotta do what a man gotta do, and during one of his missions, he failed to meet up with Rumpoey presumably to elope, while she took it as a sign that he didn't want to. Like Romeo and Juliet, she's betrothed to Kumjorn (Arawat Ruangyuth), a police captain captured by Dum's notorious gangster boss Fai (Sombat Metanee). And like all star crossed lovers whose lives are played by Fate, these events start to spin and take on a life of its own, changing the course of our characters lives forever.It's a beautifully shot movie, with plenty of pastel colours draping the sets, which at times make you cringe and beg for it to stop. As if to complement its saccharine sweet and sentimental love story, it elevates the movie to a surreal dream like level. The action sequences can be quite cheesy, with the reminiscence of old spaghetti cowboy western gun fights. But the best bits about the film, are the songs. I don't understand Thai, but even if without the subtitles interpreting the lyrics, I thought that they were beautiful enough to accentuate scenes in the movie.Perhaps my only gripe about the movie in this version of the DVD, is that the bloody violence had been censored, depriving me the bloody glee of watching the Black Tiger dispatch his opponents with his accuracy. There were scenes where footsoldiers bled by the bucketloads of ketchup, but the crucial one-on-ones were totally censored, and you wouldn't know the nitty gritty details of the death. Truly marred my enjoyment of the movie. What gives?Code 3 DVD contains some extras, like Extracts from the Book - Black Tiger's Philosophy and Rumpoey's Guilt, explaining a bit more about the lead characters, Insights into the Film Aesthetic takes a look at the Sala Raw Nang, or "Awaiting the Maiden", the quintessential Thai shelter, and how Rattana Pestonji (indie Thai filmmaker) had influenced the set design, especially the colours. The extras is topped off with a one static screen Director's Inspiration, and the list of awards which this film has won.