Great article in the Bangkok Post yesterday about Thailand’s first animated movie, Khan Kluay, about a very cute looking elephant. The article focuses on the film’s building process, discussing how difficult it is to animate elephants, who are the film’s principal characters. Director Kompin Kemgumnird, who previously worked on Ice Age:
“”Doing an animated movie about elephants was never going to be easy,” Kompin said. “In Ice Age we had only one elephant as the main character, but the animators had to work very hard to make it look natural.”“When I was an animator at Walt Disney and Bluesky Studio there were over 300 animators in the team, but we have only 100 animators working on this project, not to mention that we had to deal with a large number of elephants,” he added.
As a result he is proud of the teams effort in almost completing the project in two years.
From his experience he knew that it was difficult to make an animation feature – even in professional studios with all the high technology equipment and software. However in Thailand, he said, it was even more difficult as equipment, experience and budget were all below what you would find in the US.”
The film itself revolves around Khan Kulay’s search for his father and becoming a war elephant, so it seems to be focussing on telling something of Thailand’s history too, with the Burmese in their traditional role as the villains:
“The story begins with the young Khan Kluay living with his mother and the herd in deep jungle during the Ayutthaya era. Naughty and enjoying his freedom, Khan Kluay is also curious about his missing father so one day he decides to leave his safe haven to search for him. This is when his journey begins.The mission to find his father turns out to be a big adventure for the young elephant, one that will prepare him to follow in his father’s footsteps and become a war elephant. Soon after leaving the herd he stumbles into a Burmese army camp, hoping to find his father.
At the camp, he first meets the young future King Naresuan, who later helps him escape. However, he is caught by Ayutthaya soldiers and trained for battle. In time he will become one of the greatest war elephants in the battlefield ever.
Khan Kluay became the war elephant of King Naresuan and was on the battlefield when the Great King was duelling with the Crown Prince of Burma. After winning the battle, King Naresuan named him Chao Phraya Prab Hongsa.
The movie shows the love and friendship between the elephants as well as the relationship between elephants and humans, something that has been a part of Thai society for hundreds of years.”
There’s little other information about the film online that I can find – the Khan Kluay official site gives a taste of the main characters, but the text is all in Thai. Still, it’ll be interesting to see how the film pans out – I just hope they do a English subtitled version.
Previously: Star Wars and the King Of Thailand
More on Khan Kluay:
Spike | Google | Amazon UK | Amazon US | Wikipedia
Open Directory | Technorati: Khan Kluay
