"Uncle Boonmee Who Can Recall His Past Lives" wins this month's trophy as the longest–and perhaps oddest–name for a movie. It appeared here last fall as part of the St. Louis International Film Festival, but I did not get the opportunity to see it. Now that it has returned as part of the Webster University Film Series, I've seen it.
The writer and director, a Thai filmmaker named Apichatpong Weerasethakul (a long-name trophy winner), says, "I believe in the transmigration of souls between humans, plants, animals and ghosts."
That's rather obvious. The first scene involves a water buffalo breaking free of the rope that ties him to a tree, and then wandering the countryside. Eventually, we realize that this is one of Uncle Boonmee's past lives, as are a number of other incarnations, living and dead, real and imaginary. The director shoots in the past, present and future, in dark forests and caves and in brightly lighted cities. Boonmee is ill, apparenly recovering from stomach surgery, wearing a colostomy bag.
It's a strange movie, but not an unpleasant one, and it held my interested, mainly through curiosity to find out what came next.
"Uncle Boonmee" opens today and runs through Sunday as part of the Webster University Film Series in the Winifred Moore Auditorium.
—Joe