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Pen-Ek Ratanaruang
Roger Clarke: 'Last Life in the Universe' is a big change from 'Mon-rak Transistor'.
Pen-Ek Ratanaruang: That's true, but I've always wanted to make a film like Last Life. My first movie Fun Bar Karaoke (1997) was pretentious almost to the point of being ridiculous -I didn't know how to make a film at that time. I wrote the script for Last Life after my second film 6ixtyning (2000) but the main character was Thai and the story was a straight black comedy. Then I put it aside and made Mon-raklo prove I could do something entirely commercial.
Tell me about the script.
It's not based on anything. My girlfriend broke up with me, and I talked to a Hong Kong friend about how at the end of the day you're so tired but you don't know why: you come home and the TV is on and you're checking your internet and the left foot is playing with the dog and your new girlfriend is masturbating... the world is moving so fast. When I finished the script I didn't want to make the film. But after Mon-rak I dusted it off and gave it to a young writer friend Prabda Yoon, whom I met on the Mon-rak set - he was going out with one of the actresses. He changed it around completely: it was too comedic but he made it a mood piece.
Did you hold out for Asano and Chris Doyle or was it just luck they were available?
It was luck. Every time Doyle, Asano and I met at festivals we said we should work together. I met Asano at Deauville - he wandered into 6ixtyning one afternoon because he had nothing better to do and then we met in a bar back at the hotel and he said "Good-ah movie". Neither of us had any friends there so we just hung out, though Asano doesn't drink or smoke and goes to bed at ten. We couldn't really talk to each other either - we tried but we didn't get anywhere. Then by chance I got to know Miike Takashi at Rotterdam and Toronto so I was lucky to have Japanese connections.
I noticed an 'Ichi...