''Bangkok Dangerous'' ( th, บางกอกแดนเจอรัส เพชฌฆาตเงียบ อันตราย) is a 1999 Thai

action film Action film is a film genre in which the protagonist is thrust into a series of events that typically involve violence and physical feats. The genre tends to feature a mostly resourceful hero struggling against incredible odds, which include l ...

written and directed by the

Pang Brothers Danny Pang Phat and Oxide Pang Chun, collectively known as the Pang Brothers, are a filmmaking duo of screenwriters and film directors. The pair are twins, born in Hong Kong in 1965. Among their films is the hit Asian horror film, '' The Eye'' ...

. Stylishly edited, the story of a

deaf Deafness has varying definitions in cultural and medical contexts. In medical contexts, the meaning of deafness is hearing loss that precludes a person from understanding spoken language, an audiological condition. In this context it is written ...

and mute

hitman Contract killing is a form of murder or assassination in which one party hires another party to kill a targeted person or persons. It involves an illegal agreement which includes some form of payment, monetary or otherwise. Either party may ...

was the debut film for the twin-brother team of filmmakers. A 2008 remake of the same name starring

Nicolas Cage Nicolas Kim Coppola (born January 7, 1964), known professionally as Nicolas Cage, is an American actor and film producer. Born into the Coppola family, he is the recipient of various accolades, including an Academy Award, a Screen Actors Gui ...

was also directed by the Pangs.

Plot

Kong is a deaf-mute gunman, an

assassin Assassination is the murder of a prominent or important person, such as a head of state, head of government, politician, world leader, member of a royal family or CEO. The murder of a celebrity, activist, or artist, though they may not have a ...

for hire who can neither hear nor see his gunshots or victims. He receives his guidance through Aom, a stripper in Bangkok, who rides on his back and gives him directions. Because of his disability, he was taunted by other children and grows up into an angry young man. At a target range, he finds he has a knack for

target shooting Shooting sports is a group of competitive and recreational sporting activities involving proficiency tests of accuracy, precision and speed in shooting — the art of using ranged weapons, mainly small arms ( firearms and airguns, in forms su ...

when he visualizes the faces of the boys that taunted him in the target. His deafness gives him an edge in shooting, as he does not react to the gunshots. One day while cleaning up, a customer named Joe is at the shooting range with his girlfriend, Aom. Joe notices Kong watching them and he offers the pistol to Kong, who impresses Joe and Aom with his shooting. Joe agrees to be Kong's partner and teaches him how to shoot, while standing behind him. When Joe injures his gun hand in a battle, Kong is ready to take on more work. Working for a mob boss, Kong is sent on a job to

Hong Kong Hong Kong ( (US) or (UK); , ), officially the Hong Kong Special Administrative Region of the People's Republic of China (abbr. Hong Kong SAR or HKSAR), is a city and special administrative region of China on the eastern Pearl River Delta i ...

and when he returns to Bangkok, he catches a cold and needs medicine, so he stops at a pharmacy and meets Fon, a pretty pharmacist, who he eventually takes out a few times. This encounter changes Kong's perspective on life as he realizes that life can be meaningful, even for a deaf-mute assassin like him. Aom has trouble with one of the mob boss' henchmen. She spurns him, but he rapes her. Enraged, Joe kills the henchman, which brings the mob's wrath down on Joe, which in turn leads to more revenge killing by Kong, and a final big shoot-out in a water bottle plant. Severely injured in the battle and cornered by the police, Kong puts his head next to the mob boss's and then shoots himself in the head, killing the two of them.

Cast

*Pawalit Mongkolpisit as Kong *Premsinee Ratanasopha as Fon * Patharawarin Timkul as Aom *Pisek Intrakanchit as Joe

Reception

On review aggregator

Rotten Tomatoes Rotten Tomatoes is an American review-aggregation website for film and television. The company was launched in August 1998 by three undergraduate students at the University of California, Berkeley: Senh Duong, Patrick Y. Lee, and Stephen Wang ...

, the film has an approval rating of 51% based on 37 reviews, with an average score of 5.5/10.

Awards and nominations

*2000

Toronto International Film Festival The Toronto International Film Festival (TIFF, often stylized as tiff) is one of the largest publicly attended film festivals in the world, attracting over 480,000 people annually. Since its founding in 1976, TIFF has grown to become a perman ...

- won the international critics' ( FIPRESCI) Award *2001 International Film Festival Rotterdam - nominated for a Tiger Award.

Remake

At the

2006 Cannes Film Festival The 59th Cannes Film Festival was held from 17 to 28 May 2006. Twenty films from eleven countries were in competition for the Palme d'Or. The President of the Official selection Jury was Wong Kar-wai, the first Chinese director to preside over t ...

, the

announced they would remake ''Bangkok Dangerous'' with

in the lead role, though Cage's character would not be deaf/mute. With the working titles ''One Night in Bangkok'' and ''Time to Kill'', shooting took place in Bangkok in August 2006, and the remake was released on September 5, 2008.

References

External links

* *
Bangkok Dangerous
at MovieSet

{{DEFAULTSORT:Bangkok Dangerous (1999 Film) Films set in Thailand 1999 action thriller films 1990s crime action films Thai thriller films Thai action films Film Bangkok films Films about deaf people Films about contract killing 1999 directorial debut films Thai films remade in other languages