រោងកុនខ្មោច

Au­guste and Louis Lumière had a film ex­hi­bi­tion that toured in South­east Asia in 1894, and on June 9, 1897, “the won­der­ful Parisian cin­e­mato­graph” was screened in Bangkok, and is the first known film screen­ing in Thailand.

That same year, the film of the visit to Eu­rope by King Chu­la­longkorn was brought back to Thai­land, along with cam­era equip­ment ac­quired by the king's brother, Prince Thongth­aem Sam­bas­satra. (Thai: พระองค์เจ้าทองแถมถวัลยวงศ์ กรมหลวงสรรพสาตรศุภกิจ) The prince, con­sid­ered "the fa­ther of Thai cin­ema", made many films and his work was shown commercially.

Japan­ese busi­ness­men opened the first per­ma­nent cin­ema, the Japan­ese Cin­e­mato­graph, in 1905. Japan­ese films were so pop­u­lar that nang yipun be­came the generic term for all mov­ing pic­tures. Eu­ro­pean and Amer­i­can films were called nang farang (after thenang drama (shadow pup­pet plays) that were a Thai tra­di­tional art).

Under an­other mem­ber of the royal fam­ily, Prince Kam­beang­bejr, the Top­i­cal Film Ser­vice of the State Rail­way of Thai­land was set up. The ser­vice pro­duced many pro­mo­tional doc­u­men­taries for the rail­road and other gov­ern­ment agen­cies and be­came an im­por­tant train­ing ground for many filmmakers. One of the early works pro­duced was Sam Poi Luang: Great Cel­e­bra­tion in the North (Thai: สามปอยหลวง), a docu­d­rama that be­came a hit when it was re­leased in 1940.

An­other of the first Thai films was Nang Sao Suwan, or Miss Suwanna of Siam, a Hol­ly­wood co-pro­duc­tion with the Top­i­cal Film Ser­vice that was di­rected and scripted by Henry MacRae. It pre­miered on June 22, 1923, in Bangkok at the Phathanakorn Cin­e­mato­graph. Un­for­tu­nately, Miss Suwanna has been lost over the years.

The first all-Thai fea­ture was Chok Sorng Chan (Dou­ble Luck), pro­duced by the Wa­suwat broth­ers' Bangkok Film Com­pany in 1927 and di­rected by Manit Wa­suwat (Thai: มานิต วสุวัต). That same year, an­other film com­pany, Tai Phap­phayon Thai Com­pany, pro­duced Mai Khit Loei (Un­ex­pected).

Sev­en­teen films were made be­tween 1927 and 1932, but only frag­ments have sur­vived, such as a one-minute car chase from Chok Sorng Chan or a two- to three-minute box­ing match from Khrai Di Khrai Dai (None But the Brave).

Hol­ly­wood would also make other movies in Siam dur­ing this time, in­clud­ing the doc­u­men­tary, Chang, by Mer­ian C. Cooper andErnest B. Schoed­sack, about a poor farmer strug­gling to carve out a liv­ing in the jungle. In mak­ing the film, they were as­sisted by Prince Yu­gala Digham­bara, grand­fa­ther of mod­ern-day film­maker Cha­trichalerm Yukol.

Robert Kerr, who served as as­sis­tant di­rec­tor to Henry MacRae on Miss Suwanna re­turned to Siam in 1928 to di­rect his own film, The White Rose. It was shown in Bangkok in Sep­tem­ber 1928.

រោងកុនខ្មោច.Part1, 2, 3
រោងកុនខ្មោច.Part4, 5, Final