Ong-Bak: Muay Thai Warrior

Ong-Bak: Muay Thai Warrior (Thai: องค์บาก; IPA: [ɔːŋbaːk]) is a 2003 Thai action film. It was directed by Prachya Pinkaew, featured stunt choreography by Panna Rittikrai and starred Tony Jaa. Ong-Bak proved to be Jaa's breakout film, with the actor hailed internationally as the next major martial-arts star. Jaa went on to star in Tom-Yum-Goong (called The Protector in the US and Warrior King in the UK) and is directing a sequel to Ong-Bak, Ong-Bak 2.

Ong-Bak is an unabashed "Hey, look at what I can do!" action movie[1][2]starring the main character's martial abilities.[3] Its onrush of chase scenes, hand-to-hand combat and acrobatics, [4] sometimes shown multiple times from different angles,[3]drew notice for its quality, inventive moves [4]and lack of CGI and wire-fu.[5]

Ong-Bak: Muay Thai Warrior


The Thai movie poster.
Directed by Prachya Pinkaew
Produced by Somsak Techaratanaprasert
Prachya Pinkaew
Written by Prachya Pinkaew
Panna Ritikrai
Suphachai Sittiaumponpan
Starring Tony Jaa
Petchtai Wongkamlao
Pumwaree Yodkamol
Cinematography Nattawut Kittikhun
Editing by Thanat Sunsin,
Thanapat Taweesuk
Distributed by Sahamongkol Film International
Release date(s) January 21, 2003
Running time 105 min.
Country Thailand



Plot synopsis
The scene opens in Ban Nong Pradoo, a peaceful rural village in northeastern Thailand. A group of villagers, covered in white mud, are standing by an immense Bodhi tree, looking up to the top where a flag flaps in the gentle breeze. With a great yell, they all run toward the tree and begin to climb, knocking others away. Men fall to the ground with a thud, bouncing off branches as they go. One climber comes out on top. It is Ting, the village's best athlete and fighter. He grabs the flag, ties it around his neck and descends, deftly avoiding the other climbers.

Ting is established as a reverent, respectful young man, and is anointed as such by the village's monk, in a ceremony at the community's humble little temple that night. Though extremely skilled in muay Thai, as he demonstrates for his "Uncle Mao" (indeed, it is literally "Uncle Drunk" in Thai), he has made a vow that he will not use it to harm another person for any personal monetary gain.

It is a poor village. All it has is an ancient Buddha image, named Ong-Bak. During the night, Ting's drunken Uncle Mao stumbles into the temple to discover something bad going on. He awakes the next morning to find the Buddha statue's head missing. The villagers all despair of the bad luck that will befall them if the Buddha's head is not returned. Ting speaks up and says he will recover it at all costs.

The villagers all chip in, giving up treasured baht and hoarded trinkets to pay for Ting's way to Bangkok, where he is to meet his ne'er-do-well cousin Humlae and get help in tracking down the men who stole Ong-Bak's head.

In the city, we find that Humlae has dyed his hair blond and renamed himself George, since his village name, "Humlae", also means "Dirty Balls". He and his friend, Muay Lek, are street-bike racing hustlers who have fallen in with a bad crowd of yaba dealers.

Humlae is at first reluctant to help Ting, but when he sees the small fortune in coins that Ting has collected from his village, Humlae takes an immediate interest. And, when Ting is in the bathroom, Humlae grabs the sack and heads for a bar on Khaosan Road where an illegal boxing match is going on. Ting tracks Humlae down, but instead of getting his money back, he ends up fighting and being named the new champion after one high knee smash waylays the old champ.

This makes Ting an enemy of Komtuan, a gray-haired, wheelchair-bound crimelord who needs an electrolarynx to speak. He's been watching the fight from his private room, and losing money because Ting keeps beating his fighters.

Meanwhile, back in Ting's village, there is bad luck indeed. The ground is dusty and full of cracks and all that's left in the village well is muddy water. They need the Buddha's head back for the drought to end and good luck to return to the village.

George keeps working shady deals, with he and Muay Lek working a scam at a baccarat game in an illegal casino. Eventually, the scams catch up with him, and the drug dealer shows up to give George a beating. Ting ignores George's cries for help, but when the drug dealer starts smacking Muay Lek around, Ting takes care of things. But then the drug dealer's friends and the cheated casino boss show up and a footchase through the alleys ensues, with Ting showing off his acrobatic skill as he walks over crowds, jumps through a barbed-wire hoop, leaps over a rack of sharp tools, cartwheels through a narrow space between two panes of glass, and does a gymnastics move over a wok of hot oil.

That night, there is another fight at the bar. Ting is egged on by Big Bear, a vulgar Australian fighter. Finally, after Big Bear beats another Thai man and assaults a waitress, Ting takes up the fight and easily beats the hulking man. He then must fight Toshiro, a very fast Japanese fighter, and finally Mad Dog, another farang, who favors the use of such objects as chairs, tables and even a refrigerator to punch and smash his opponents with.

Muay Lek, meanwhile, has been struggling to keep her older sister Ngek from using drugs. Ngek has fallen in with a small time crook named Don. Muay Lek shows up at Don's apartment with George and Ting to find her sister overdosed. George and Ting take off and chase the boyfriend in tuk-tuks, with several of Don's buddies joining in. The tuk-tuks take to an elevated expressway, and the scene climaxes with many tuk-tuks driving off the edge of an unfinished portion of the highway.

Ting follows the bad guys and ends up at the port and in the Chao Phraya River, where he discovers a cache of stolen Buddha images. This leads back to the gangster Komtuan, who makes Ting fight one of his bodyguards who has been treating himself with drugs, making him full of rage and impervious to pain.

Eventually, Ting and George are taken to the gangster's hideout in the mountains, where the head of a giant Buddha image is being chiseled away. There is a final showdown, ending in the Buddha head falling on Komtuan. George rolls away before the giant Buddha head hits him, but dies as a result of injuries inflicted upon him by being beaten by a sledgehammer while trying to protect Ong-Bak's head from its blows.

The head of the Ong-Bak Buddha statue is restored in the temple of Ting's village. Ting, now ordained as a monk with shaven head and white robes, arrives into the village in a procession on an elephant's back while the villagers celebrate his ordination.



Production
Background
Featuring amazing chase sequences and bouts of intense, but gracefully choreographed violence, as well as Tony Jaa's own acrobatic agility and fighting prowess, Ong-Bak became most notable for eschewing CGI and wires in favour of physical stunts for its outrageous action sequences (however, a crane was used to lift a tuk-tuk during one sequence). Indeed, much of the film's international advertising boasted of the fact, with a tagline stating: "No stunt doubles, no computer images, no strings attached."

The film introduced international audiences to a traditional form of muay Thai (or Muay Boran, an ancient muay Thai style), a kickboxing style that is known for violent strikes with fist, feet, shins, elbows and knees. The fights were choreographed by Panna Rittikrai, who is also Tony Jaa's mentor and a veteran director of B-movie action films that all feature realistic stunt work.

Jaa was trained in Muay Thai since childhood, he wanted to bring Muay Thai to mainstream so he decided to make this movie. Jaa and Panna struggled to raise money to produce a demo reel to drum up interest for the making the film. Their first reel was made on expired film stock, so they had to raise more money and start over.




Stunts
During the foot chase through the alleys, there is writing on a shop house door that reads "Hi Spielberg, let do it together." This refers to Tony Jaa's desire to someday work with Steven Spielberg.[6]
During the tuk-tuk chase, when a tuk-tuk falls off the elevated highway and hits a building, the following message is written on a pillar on the left side of the screen: "Luc Besson, we are waiting for you." The French producer-director's company, EuropaCorp, would go on to purchase the international selling rights to Ong-Bak outside Asia.
One of Tony Jaa's favorite scenes is at the gas station. With his trousers on fire, Ting kicked one of the villains in the face. The flames spread upwards very fast and burned Tony's eyebrows, eyelashes and nose. He then had to do a couple of more takes to make sure it was right.



Alternate versions

After Ong-Bak became a hit in Thailand, sales rights for outside Asia were purchased by Luc Besson's EuropaCorp, which in turn re-edited the film.

Most of the subplot involving Muay Lek's sister, Ngek, was removed.

The French company also rescored the soundtrack with some hip-hop sounds, replacing the Thai rock score, and it's this version that has been made available in the United States.

For the United Kingdom release, the soundtrack was scored yet again, this time with an orchestral score.

The Hong Kong cut of the film's theatrical release omits a "bone breaking" sequence toward the end, where George's arm is snapped and Ting in turn snaps the leg of a bad guy. DVD releases in Hong Kong have the scene restored.


An "alternate ending" offered on the Thai DVD release has George surviving. He is seen at the end bandaged up, limping, with his leg broken, supported by his parents.



Alternate titles
In Thailand, it was simply called Ong-Bak. This name was preserved in Premier Asia's UK release.
For the release in Singapore and other territories, as well as film festivals, the movie was released as Ong-Bak: Muay Thai Warrior.
In the United States and some other places, the movie was released as Ong-Bak: The Thai Warrior.
The Hong Kong English title was Thai Fist.
In Japan, the film was released as Mahha! (the Japanese word for "Mach").
In Italy the title was Ong-Bak: Nato per Combattere, which translates Ong-Bak: Born to Fight.
In México the title was Ong-Bak: El Nuevo Dragón, which translates in to Ong-Bak: The New Dragon. in reference to Bruce Lee
The Indian release featured the title "Enter the new dragon" also in refence to Bruce Lee

Subtitle issues, DVD releases
English subtitles were absent from early DVD releases of Ong-Bak. The Thai release omitted the subtitles, as did the versions released in Hong Kong, Japan and South Korea.

For a time, the only legal home-video version of Ong-Bak with English subtitles was a Hong Kong VCD, but the translations were generally pretty poor.

With the UK and US DVD releases, Ong Bak became officially available with English subtitles, but those are versions that have been re-edited. There's an Australian-issued DVD that's a two-disc package featuring both the original Thai cut and Luc Besson's version.



Box office
On February 11, 2005, the film was released in North America at 387 theatres under the title Ong-Bak: The Thai Warrior. In its opening weekend, it grossed US $1,334,869 ($3,449 per screen), on its way to a total of US $4,563,167.

Sequel
After Ong-Bak became a huge worldwide hit, Jaa's name was attached to many projects. He went on to act in a small role in the Petchtai Wongkamlao vehicle, The Bodyguard (co-directed by Panna Rittikrai), and then starred in the much-anticipated Tom-Yum-Goong in 2005. In March 2006, it was announced that filming for Ong Bak 2 would start that fall and be released sometime in 2008, with Jaa as director.

References
Yusof, Zack (November 21, 2003). "Selling a Thai style", The Star (Malaysia). (Retrieved from Google cache on March 28, 2006)
Franklin, Erika (May 2005). "Alive and Kicking: Tony Jaa interviewed", Firecracker Media.
^ "The slender story line of good vs. evil is an excuse for many terrific fight scenes." Ong-Bak: The Thai Warrior review, Film-Forward.com
^ "Anyone looking for story or character should check out now. -- the only reason to see it is for the action. In that arena, on a scale from 1 to 10, it’s a 20." George Wu, Ong-Bak: The Thai Warrior review, Culturevulture.net
^ a b "You're pinned back in your chair, worried that Tony Jaa, a human hurricane of fists and flying feet, will jump out and kick you in the face." Phil Villarreal, Jaa's fists and feet take flight in 'Warrior'. Arizona Daily Star
^ a b "Certainly, they create a few moves that have never been done before. ...the appeal here is the action, and once they get past all the narrative setups, the stunts are relentless." Andrew Sun, Ong-Bak review, The Hollywood Reporter
^ "Counteracting recent exposure to the numbing effects of computer-generated and wire-supported tricks... ...the artifice-free antidote to such F/X enervation..." Lisa Schwarzbaum, Ong-Bak: The Thai Warrior review, Entertainment Weekly
^ Duong, Sehn. August 16, 2006. Tony Jaa Says No to "Rush Hour 3," "Yes! Yes!" to Indy 4, and Reveals "Ong Bak 2" Tidbits, Rotten Tomatoes (retrieved August 24, 2006)

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