Highly Overrated But Still Good

A Disappointing Continuation

Strong acting helps the film overcome an uncertain premise and create characters that hold our attention absolutely.

Through painfully honest and emotional moments, the movie becomes irresistibly relatable

I am sorry, but this movie stinks. I don't care how many people write good reviews, I couldn't wait for the movie to end. In fact I nearly turned it off half way through.The positive aspect of this movie is the splendid use of color contrast, especially the bright red of the woman's dress and lips nearly matching the roof of the Pagoda in a drab blue-green background. Some of the backdrops were cartoonish, others just colorful.When you have a bunch of Thai guys running around in cowboy outfits with Clark Gable mustaches, you expect something funny to happen, which it did when the main character, a likeable outlaw, shoots his gun. Unfortunately this "Trinity" aspect wasn't used enough to save this film. Our outlaw is part of a weak love triangle which involves a woman who he knew when he was 10, now the governor's daughter. A captain in the militia hunting outlaws, and our bad guy, "The Black Tiger." Dum (the Black Tiger) is the main character, short for Dumas. I wasn't sure what this meant. Was this something in Thai lost in translation? A reference to the author Dumas? or a slur that the guy is simply a dum-as?The colors in the movie are nice, it might rank 7 stars on acid. Please don't attempt to watch this movie sober, leave that to the professionals.

This feels more like the post modernist classic that American critics claim Pulp Fiction was. Fah talai jone is a bravura technicolor clash of colors and vibrant energy. Imagine Andy Warhol and Takashi Miike collaborating on making a 1950s popcorn counter postcard come alive and you get some sense of what its all about.The themes and motifs though are very archetypal and familiar. Cowboy and Western motifs abound in what is decidedly an Eastern film, and the plot structure is the stuff of pure romantic formula - a boy meets girl, boy loses girl, boy gets girl in the end.But its this movie's style that invigorates. Its a romp in the good old fashioned sense, where the frenetic use of color, editing and in your face acting is what makes it so unique.Another example that Thailand punches above its weight.

Despite the surprising success of oddball flicks like Napoleon Dynamite or Shaun of the Dead, most weird little films that become "cult" favorites evolve over time. Occasionally, one can spot a candidate from day one, like this bizarre Thai import mixing Spaghetti Westerns with 1950s-style sappy romantic dramas, touches of campy comedy, and hokey, mournful love songs. Non-sequiturs among the clothes and props defy a time-line for the action. As the film careens among its genres, aided by absurdly florid colors and a few surreal stage backdrops, following the story is like watching others play ping-pong.Young love, forbidden by class differences, eventually causes one peasant lad to become the fastest gun in an outlaw gang. The landowner's daughter is engaged to an ambitious police captain, though she still loves the playmate of her youth. Some of the acting is so bad it must have been intentional. The comedy aspects aren't enough to make it special; the romance and drama side won't work up any tears, because there's no way to take the lovers and their travails seriously. But as a cultural novelty, this one's worth a look. How many chances do you think you'll get to watch the Thai equivalent of Jesse James' gang on horseback, racing through rice paddies, and fighting the cops with six-shooters and bazookas?

"Tears of the black Tiger" is a one of a kind western from Thailand. In fact it's the only other film I have seen from Thailand besides "Last life in the Universe. Miramax owns the U.S rights to the film, but for some odd reason it was never released and continues to collect dust on their shelf. The film has a bright Technicolor style similar to "the Wizard of Oz" and Guy Maddin's "Careful". O.K., so take these bright surreal elements and add over the top Peckinpah / Pete Jackson style shoot outs, a romantic story and musical interludes. In other words, you're prepared for an experience that is out of this world.The best way to describe it is ... a hilarious and romantic candy colored spaghetti western with Asian cowboys and bloody shootouts. If you are searching for something completely different and original, you came to the right place.