Chocolate
Short description
Chocolate is a Thai action film about Zen, a teenage girl with autism who has an exceptional ability to absorb and copy martial arts techniques. She lives with her mother, Zin, a former gang member who left that life behind after falling for Masashi, a Japanese yakuza. When Zin is diagnosed with cancer and the family cannot afford her care, Zen and her friend Mangmoom find a notebook listing people who owe Zin money from her past. They set out to collect those debts, only to find that the debtors are dangerous criminals connected to a syndicate run by a gangster known as No. 8, whose grudge against Zin goes back years.
The film was directed by Prachya Pinkaew, his third feature after Ong-Bak and The Protector, and produced by Sahamongkolfilm with a budget of about five million dollars. It stars JeeJa Yanin as Zen, Hiroshi Abe as Masashi, Pongpat Wachirabunjong as No. 8, Taphon Phopwandee as Mangmoom, and Ammara Siripong as Zin. It was released in February 2008 and runs 93 minutes.
Worldwide box office came in below its production budget, though the film found a substantial audience on home viewing and holds a 6.9 rating on IMDb from around 20,000 votes and a 7.3 on TMDB from a much smaller base. A critics' rating of 6.2 from 38 reviews places it below the audience scores.
What's left behind the scenes
- In 2003, at the age of 19, Yanin Vismitananda auditioned for a role in Panna Rittikrai's thriller "Born to Fight" (2004). During the audition, she made such an impression that they decided to give her not a bit part, but to make her the main character. Vismitananda dropped out of school and, for two years while the film was in pre-production, trained with stunt performers in Chinese boxing, gymnastics, stunt preparation, learned to handle weapons, and also studied acting.
- Yanin Vismitananda performed all the stunts for her role herself. Once during filming at night, Vismitananda was so exhausted that she missed a kick to the face. Filming had to be interrupted for a week, and Vismitananda spent the entire time with an eye patch.
- Periodically, Yanin Vismitananda's character eats candy in the same way that Jackie Chan did in some of his films.
- The characters of Yanin Vismitananda and Tapthona Phopwandee watch the action film "Ong-Bak" (2003) together, and at some point, Vismitananda's character watches the action film "Dragon Tiger Gate" (2005) alone. Both of these films were directed by Prachya Pinkaew (director and producer of "Chocolate"), and starred Tony Jaa.
- Initially, it was planned that Yanin Vismitananda's character would watch films with Bruce Lee and Jackie Chan (in addition to action movies with Tony Jaa), but they were unable to obtain permission for this. For the same reason, some other scenes also had to be cut from the film.
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