A Fun Film for Keris and Dyak Blade Lovers!!

[CharlesS]

I just finished watching the 2010 Thai film The Legend of the Tsunami Warrior. It was a little hokey but fun, and somehow seemed to be the Thai take on The Pirates of the Carribean franchise! Lots of goofy magic, but the really appealing thing was that this movie was set among the pirate seas of southern Thailand and the Malay pennisula in the mid-late 1500s. There were mandaus, sundangs, and keris galore, with a jimpul thrown in from time to time for good measure, not to mention fascinating costumes. Many of the weapons seemed oversized, but somebody in the film's creation was at least trying to go for a correct style of weapon.

We collectors rarely get to see weapons of this type shown in feature films so it was a real treat for me.

Oddly, as a Thai film I don't think I counted a single dha!

It may never be a classic, but was a fun flick for the ethnographic sword collector!

[ThePepperSkull]

I was introduced to this film with the title Queens of Langkasuka.


Very nice movie to watch if you want to watch a fantasy film with loads of swashbuckling goodness. My favourite was Dan Chupong as the General, Lord Jarang. I'm a big fan of his and Tony Jaa's, and seeing him swinging a three-luk sundang with an ivory kakatua hilt definitely caught the attention of the ethnographic blade enthusiast in me.

In terms of how I felt the film was, however, I thought there was too much going on to fit into one film. The overall narrative would have benefitted by breaking it up into several films. That way, the characters would have been fleshed out more, the stakes for defending Langkasuka would have had time to sink in (not to mention that the suspense could have been built up regarding the impending raid), and there could have been a bigger exploration of what I thought was the main character, Pari, and his Luke-Skywalker-esque journey from simple small-tribe Dayak boy into Dulum(this film's equivalent to the Force)-wielding mystic.

Basically I felt that everything moved to fast for a fantasy epic. If I watch this with the mindset of action/swashbuckler, though, I am more than thorougly amused and in that respect this film did really really well.

...but if we had this movie spread over several parts, we would have gotten to see Dan Chupong kick more butt as Lord Jarang: