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Introduction

Thailand, Singapore, France, Netherlands, Philippines / 2022 / 84 min
Director：Sorayos PRAPAPA

Arnold, winner of both the gold medal at the International Mathematics Olympiad and the “Model Student” award at his school. One day he meets Mr. Bee, who runs an underground business helping students to cheat on their college entrance exams, and ends up joining him in his racket. At the same time, many of his classmates have started to protest, in frustration with the school’s contempt for their freedom. The feature film debut of Sorayos PRAPAPAN, who began his career as production assistant on Apichatpong WEERASETHAKUL’s “Uncle Boonmee Who Can Recall His Past Lives” (2010) and went on to direct many short films while working mainly as a sound engineer. An entertaining film full of witty humor and sarcasm with an undercurrent of quiet anger, the script went through major revisions in light of the “Bad Student” protest movement by high school students that actually occurred in Thailand in 2020. The manner in which PRAPAPAN has the film skillfully shifting between cynicism and sincerity is brilliant. Had its world premiere in the Concorso Cineasti del presente section for emerging directors at the 2022 Locarno Film Festival.

Director's Statement

I grew up in a country where there are limits on freedom of expression. My country’s government uses propaganda and the education system to make its people subservient. Thai students grow up with nonsensical rules which violate human rights. Male and female school children are forbidden to wear their hair in the way they like, though they are at the age of self- discovery. This turns Thai children into adults who don’t understand their own rights.

In 2020, Thai students formed a group called ‘Bad Student’ to question the country’s education system, protest against abusive school regulations, and call for educational reform. This film is inspired by the book Student Survival Guides which the Bad Student group put together to help Thai schoolchildren learn about their rights and freedom.

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