Tropical Malady

Winner of the Special Jury Prize at the 2004 Cannes Film Festival, Tropical Malady is the lyrical and mysterious film by maverick Thai director Apichatpong Weerasethakul, one of the most prominent directors of the Thai New Wave. 

Tropical Malady chronicles the mystical love affair between a young soldier and the country boy he seduces, soon to be disrupted by the boy’s sudden disappearance. Local legends claim the boy was transformed into a mythic wild beast, and the soldier journeys alone into the heart of the Thai jungle in search of him. The film made the BFI’s Sight and Sound list of the “Greatest Films of All Time” for the first time in 2022.

The film screens in a 35mm collection print courtesy of the UCLA Film & Television Archive.

Part of our Greatest Films of All Time? series