This Blog is not Dead

This blog is not dead and I can prove it. Just last week I was out in the field digging up the remains of old movie theaters which will be written up into drivulous little essays in due time. At this point I've got a backlog of material dating to 2015, October, which I've neglected to get around to for one reason or another.

Actually, the reasons are two fold. One, as I stand awkwardly on the doorstep of middle age, I've begun to care a bit more about my personal finances. Meaning I'd like to have some to speak of.

The second and more pressing reason is that what's left of my creative juices are being squeezed out into a book on Thailand's movie theater. In fact, it's called just that: "Thailand's Movie Theaters: relics, ruin and the romance of escape." After many delays and restarts, there is finally light at the end of the tunnel. Writing for a book, unlike writing for a piss-ant personal blog like this, is no easy feat. Not for a mediocre like me, anyhow. So rather than squander my creativity on senseless blog posts, I've been rerouting them to said book. Again, no easy task.

But in the name of keeping the SEAMTP faithful happy (if any of you still exist), here is a mini-post to prove, once and for all, that I still love doing this work, and that as long as there's a few people out there willing to read what I write and look at my pictures, I'll fulfill my end of the non-existent social contract we don't have between us.

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Welcome to carbon monoxide corner. Better known as Rangsit. Thailand's tailpipe. The most charmless blotch of civilization ever. Within this context of ten-lane, at-grade highways and sub-brutalist retail blocks - completely devoid of plant life - stands an equally charmless stand-alone movie theater.

Say hello to the Petch Rangsit Theater. In its current condition, it's the type of place where street dogs go to die, but not before defecating in it while they're living. Whatever type of grace-saving signage this building once had has been removed, leaving a featureless concrete box covered in soot and tropical mold.

Rangsit was apparently once a relatively charming Bangkok hinterland. An agriculturally productive area highlighted by the eponymous Rangsit Canal. When built, the canal was one of those key infrastructure projects that solidifies a place's economic clout. After completion in the early 1900's, the canal helped further centralize Bangkok as the nation's commercial hub by connecting the Chao Phraya River with the Nakorn Nayok River and opening up huge swaths of land to agricultural production.

The canal made Rangsit into a junction from the beginning. But since the arrival of the highway system, Rangsit has been transformed into one of the country's biggest transit corridors, hence the pollution and general lack of charm.

By the looks of it, The Petch Rangsit Theater was built in the early 1980's, part of the larger commercial quarter described in not-so-glowing terms above. An edge city development predicated on cars and buses from the get go. The lot in front of the theater, in fact, is now a local bus terminus, which indicates that the theater was built to capture that transitory population.

In its working days, the Petch Rangsit was a second run theater that was routinely programmed with triple features, a business model which fits the come-and-go needs of a transient clientele.

Of the several thousand people that pass it on a daily basis en route to or from Bangkok and points beyond, very few likely have an inkling of what it was, or that it once made this slice of automotive hell a little bit better.

The Pruttinan Theater - Ranong, Thailand

Ranong is the only province in Thailand's south that still projects a frontier character. From a few choice angles it feels almost as if the choke of the jungle was hacked away just a few years prior.

There's a well warranted historical precedent for Ranong's frontier quality. Besides having an active border crossing - a frontier in the most literal sense - from the late 19th up into the early 20th century, the province's economy was centered on a series of tin mines. Labor intensive extractive industries of that caliber attracted a particularly grizzled type of settler. From the back breaking labor of those mostly Chinese migrant workers, a slice of modern Thai civilization was born. 

The tin mines are now long gone, but the town that they helped spawn is still present in its narrow lanes and stoic old shop houses. And much to the delight of this photographer, a trio of old movie theaters are still standing. The most notable of them being The Pruttinan Theater, featured in this post.

The last and most architecturally impressive of the movie theaters built in Ranong is the Pruttinan Theater

If there were an award for the best Brutalist movie theater in Thailand it would  easily go to The Pruttinan. This beast of a building has been tantalizing me since I first came across a photo of it 7 years ago in an online forum. Said photo depicted the theater while it was still in operation, with its dimensional signage perched just above its concrete roof line. The signage has since been removed, detracting a bit from The Pruttinan's provenance, but not so much as to damage its general Brutal aesthetic.

The Pruttinan is a free standing building towards the northern end of Ranong's main commercial street. It's hulking, Brutalist girth combined with its stand-alone placement give off a fortress quality. If one didn't know better, it might be mistaken for a modern day castle, built by the descendant of a tin tycoon or something.  

Pruttinan through the weeds

I forget the exact year of The Pruttinan's construction, though I know it was sometime around the turn of the 1980's. That's right about when car ownership started to become a staple of the Thai middle class. With that in mind, the Pruttinan was designed with a large parking garage beneath the auditorium, giving it a competitive advantage over the 3 other theaters in town in terms of access. 

But alas, even such modern conveniences couldn't keep it from going under.

In its final years, The Pruttinan was managed by Coliseum Films, southern Thailand's main movie distributor. It closed down while under their helm in about the year 2000.

It's since been converted into a swiftlet nesting house. 

The Pata Theater - Yala, Thailand

Before the strife 

in southern deep

Movies shown 

and on the cheap

Picture houses 

grand and small

Brought great delight 

to one and all

Of three or four 

across this city

A brutal gem 

lurks in the nitty

Concrete bleak 

with retro fittings

A sight to see

 for the unwitting

To see this hall

one must enter

Into a zone

a bit off center

Market smells

of fallen rot

Waft through the air

to mar the spot

Rats with wings

perch on the wires

A blighted scene

to cull desires

In lobby filth

upon the ground

Unlucky man

upon is found

With habits etched

into his brain

Oh man! his actions

were insane

So much so

to not repeat

Just think, what might

one do with meat?

If not for man

oh slacken creeper

Venture in

we'd dig much deeper

But eerie sounds

and uncouth scents

Wicked sights

of people bent

Our gaze was stuck

upon facade

Without much luck

in land so odd

Yet old past glory

it must be stated

A noble story

to be related

Relate in photos

it must suffice

For Pata Theater

was once real nice

The Siri Phanon Rama - Phanom Sarakam, Chachoengsao, Thailand

In Thailand, generally speaking, the word brutalism has greater association with repressive military governments than the mid-20th century architectural milieu it was coined to represent. The power-seizing, self-appointing generals, by their very own actions, have done more to correlate Thailand with the term than the hard-angled, concrete-heavy building style ever could. But alas, Brutalism the architecture and brutalism the way of governing exist in tandem in the Land of Smiles. As for the former, sometimes it can be found in the most unusual places. 

One of those unusual places is in the heart of Chachoengsao Province. On the far edge of the little trading town of Phnom Sarakam stands one of the most definitively Brutalist cinema halls ever seen in the country - the Siri Phanom Rama

Roadside marquee and entrance gate to the Siri Phanom Rama.  

The Siri Phanom Rama

The Siri Phanom Rama was completed in 1978 as the economic anchor of a surrounding retail/residential complex that was built simultaneously. It was the 3rd theater ever erected in the district and will likely be the last.

Poster cases in the lower lobby of the Siri Phanom Rama

Early this year, the movie distribution company with jurisdiction over eastern Thailand (Saman Films) made the decision do deal strictly in digital cinema, doing away with traditional film altogether. Instead of investing tens of thousands of dollars in a new digital projection system to bring entertainment to a small handful of movie-goers, the owner of the Siri Phanom Rama opted to close the theater down, thus ending a 36 year run as the lone theater in the district. 

The final movie was screened in February. 

"Next Program"

Stairwell shot with window

Upper lobby of the Siri Phanom Rama

Brutalism softened by the font of the dimensional signage. 

Signage

Brutalism developed into the architecture of choice for government buildings across the world in the 1960's and 70's. Its hard and heavy aesthetic was meant to convey a sense of infallibility, of permanence and of fortitude. Movie theaters likewise got the Brutalist treatment on occasion - particularly in Asia. In Thailand, at least one other theater highlighted on this site is characterized by Brutalist design.

Throughout the world today, however, Brutalist architecture is under threat. As examples of it approach or surpass the half-century mark, the overwhelming opinion among casual observers is not sympathetic to the style's future. For many, Brutalism's association with socialist-leaning governments of the mid-20th century leave a bitter taste. For others the style is simply perceived as ugly or unsightly, thus unworthy of preservation.

In response, a movement in defense of Brutalism has been ever-so-slightly gaining momentum, if only by building awareness of the style in general. Nevertheless, advocacy before the fact may work wonders in staving off wholesale destruction of the style as cities around the world rethink their futures.  

As for unused Brutalist movie theaters in Thailand, well, at least now you know that some exist.