Title: The Moon (Pumpuang)
Year: 2011
Genre: Drama / Musical
Director : Bundit Thongdee
Country: Thailand
Sound: Thai
Subtitle: none
Starring : Paowalee Pornpimol, Nuttawut Sakitjai, Wittaya Jetapai


2 VCDs
Release date : 30 November 2011

Story :

Pumpuang Duanchan was the fifth of 12 children of a family of migrant farmers in Suphan Buri. She grew up singing to her siblings in the sugarcane fields. The family was poor, and could not afford to send their children to school.

When she was around eight years old, Pumpuang was taken by her father to see a singer-songwriter whose troupe was playing at a local temple fair. Dad begged the music guru to take his daughter, in order to get the girl away from the hardships of farm life and to make for one less mouth to feed at home. Though he was visibly moved by Pumpuang's a capella singing audition, the music man refused, telling the Pumpuang and her father that she should go to school and grow up a little.

Pumpuang never went to school, but she did enter music contests, winning many prizes.

As a teenager, she again asked her father to take her to see the music guru. But the man was in Bangkok; how could they find him?

Well, Pumpuang may not have ever learned to read, but she did possess a steel-trap mind – she had memorized the man's phone number, which she'd seen on a poster during her visit years before.

So the father and daughter boarded the bus to Bangkok. I think the same ricketedy old bus they used back then is still running today. They tracked down the music guru, and after a suspenseful all-day wait on the street, he took the girl into his home.

Here's where Pumpuang recalls some of the same story beats as Pen-ek Ratanaruang's luk thung comedy Monrak Transistor, in which the main character, following his dreams of being a singing star, ends up mopping floors at the music company for two-and-a-half years, waiting for his big break. That's what Pumpuang started doing – swabbing the deck while watching others dance and singing to herself while sorting sequined costumes.

She moves up after another singer is let go because she was caught having a romantic relationship. That's one of the rules of the house, posted like the 10 commandments beneath a photo of god himself, the slain "Thai Elvis" Suraphol Sombatcharoen.

It's a rule Pumpuang herself would not heed, as she finds herself growing close to saxophonist Teeraphol Saensuk (Nathawut Sakidjai) and the two are eventually caught and kicked out of the musical troupe.

On their own, Pumpuang and Teeraphol develop a symbiotic relationship – she needs him to read her the lyrics, which she memorizes with her photographic mind, and he needs her for her singing talent, so he can ride on her glittery coattails.

But Pumpuang is also capable of forging her own path. A scene that demonstrates her indomitable spirit is when she's working as a back-up dancer in a nightclub and the club owner is blatantly going to cheat her out of money. She refuses to accept that kind of treatment, and though the club owner forbids her to return, she's back the next night, and stares the old man down with fiery eyes. Later, when a comedian doesn't show up, Pumpuang takes the stage herself, and shows she's not only a great singer, she excels in slapstick as well.

Forming her own band with Teeraphol as manager, she hits the road, but runs into problems with rival luk thung troupes and their hired thugs. Sparsely attended shows are countered with lowered ticket prices. A bullet hole in one of her signs is plastered over with a sticker saying "free admission". A sleeping driver of the tour bus threatens to bring everything to a halt, but then a Bangkok producer makes her an offer she can't refuse. And I have to wonder if the slick Bangkok promoter drugged the bus driver himself.

While Teeraphol is opposed to changing luk thung to appeal to Bangkok audiences, Pumpuang eagerly accepts – she wants her music to be heard by as many people as possible so she can make more money so that she can take care of her family. Her goal is to perform luk thung in one of Bangkok's finest hotels, the Dusit Thani.

It's this iron-willed work ethic that Pumpuang has, to please her fans and take care of her family, that proves to be her undoing. After she collapses onstage, it's revealed she as lupus, an autoimmune disorder that saps her strength and worsens if she works too much or gets stressed out. In short, she has to stop performing or she'll die.

She does try to make a go of doing less work. She takes time to learn to read and write, making for a particularly tearful scene in which she sends a note to Teeraphol, who has run off, telling him to come back home.