By the Time It Gets Dark
Anocha Suwichakornpong: A Retrospective
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1h 46m
Directed by Anocha Suwichakornpong | 106 mins | 2016
Suwichakornpong’s second feature presents itself as a straightforward arthouse film about a young director, Ann (Visra Vichit-Vadakan), preparing a project about the 1976 massacre of student activists at Thammasat University. As its protagonist faces a creative crisis, however, it suddenly splinters into a plethora of different styles—documentary, pop musical, melodrama, “post-internet” digital meltdown finale—whose frustration of audience expectations mirrors Ann’s own frustration at trying to understand an unknowable history.
Up Next in Anocha Suwichakornpong: A Retrospective
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Nightfall
Directed by Anocha Suwichakornpong | 15 mins | 2016
An unnamed Thai woman, both flâneur and researcher, discovers traces of her native country inscribed on Singapore’s urban landscape in this mellow essay film, conceived as a light-touch fictionalization of Suwichakornpong’s experiences during an... -
The Ambassadors
Directed by Anocha Suwichakornpong | 9 mins | 2018
Dotted with striking statues of prehistoric creatures, a popular tourist destination in Thailand provides the setting for a gently surreal meeting of Thai and British history, and of two of contemporary experimental cinema’s key figures: Suwichak... -
The Line
Directed by Anocha Suwichakornpong | 17 mins | 2020
An artist and gallery staff prepare for the launch of a show that uses the winding vessel of the Mekong to play with concepts of spacetime and animism—much as this short does itself. It’s one of five shorts featured in the anthology film "Mekong...
