Tom-Yum-Goong

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This article is about the 2005 Thai action film. For the Thai food dish see Tom yum.

Tom-Yum-Goong (Thai: ต้มยำกุ้ง, distributed as Warrior King in the UK and The Protector in the US) is a 2005 Thai martial arts film starring Tony Jaa. The movie was directed by Prachya Pinkaew, who also directed Jaa's prior breakout film . As with Ong-Bak, the fights were choreographed by Jaa and his mentor, Panna Rittikrai.

Contents

1 Plot
2 Production

2.1 Technical aspects
2.2 Fighting styles
2.3 Bootleg version

3 External links

Plot

Kham (Tony Jaa) is the last in a family line of guards who have once watched over the King of Thailand's war elephants.

[Spoiler warningSpoiler warning]: Plot and/or ending details follow.

Kham is the last of a family line of guards who once watched over the King of Thailand's war elephants. His family's white elephant (which is meant to be presented to the king) and its calf are stolen and smuggled to Australia, where Chinese triads and Vietnamese gangs rule the streets. Kham journeys to the land down under in search of the prized pachyderms, but encounters fierce resistance.

In his quest to retrieve his elephants, Kham becomes allies with a Thai-Australian police inspector and a young Thai woman who was forced into prostitution.

Production

Technical aspects

Compared to , which was noted for its lack of wirework and CGI, this movie uses CGI in several scenes, from the obvious (helicopter scene, and an entirely computer-animated dream sequence), to the subtle (a glass window shattering in the four-minute steadicam shot that follows Jaa up several flights of stairs as he dispatches thug after thug in dramatic fashion).

Fighting styles

Tony Jaa incorporates a new style of muay Thai into this movie (มวยคชสาร, roughly translated as "Elephant Boxing"), emphasizing grappling moves. The fights in this film include duels with: a wushu martial artist (Jon Foo), a Vietnamese triad captain (Spider-man stunt double Johnny Nguyen), a capoeira fighter (Lateef Crowder), an extraordinarily strong bodyguard (Brad Pitt's first opponent in the movie Troy and former WWE wrestler Nathan Jones), and a whip-wielding transsexual triad boss (world renowned ballerina Jing Xing).

Bootleg version

A bootleg version of the film (with subtitles that refer to the main character a "Jin" despite having "Kham" on the back of the box, as well as subtitles for the spoken English that does not match what is being said) can be found at some mall kiosks throughout the United States. The box art states the movie is "Ong Bak 2".

External links

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