Breaking the Cycle review – meet the charismatic Thai politician striving to change his country’s history

Gripping documentary examines the Future Forward Party’s unprecedented 2019 election result, and its leader’s aim to break Thailand’s repeated military coups With his disarming good looks, pro-democracy activist and businessman Thanathorn Juangroongruangkit resembles an actor rather than a typical Thai politician. Heir to the country’s largest car manufacturer, he is blessed not only with personable charisma but also inexhaustible funds. His stunning rise into public consciousness is the beating heart of Aekaphong Saransate and Thanakrit Duangmaneeporn’s debut film, a thrilling documentary about an extraordinary political campaign that shook a nation. As founder of the progressive Future Forward Party (FFP), Juangroongruangkit’s central message cut through the noise of electoral politics: secure a brighter future by correcting the wrongs of the past. Since the end of absolute monarchy in 1932, Thailand has undergone a never-ending cycle of military takeovers, including 12 coups. Dur...

Dance Craze review – thrilling documentary captures the explosive energy of 2 Tone

Joe Massot’s vivid 1981 film about the British ska scene brims with life, sweat and the faces of ecstatic fans

US director Joe Massot, known for the psychedelic 60s curiosity Wonderwall and Led Zeppelin concert movie The Song Remains the Same, directed this tremendously vivid 1981 documentary about the British 2 Tone movement, this vital music being a kind of evolutionary product of reggae’s coexistence with punk the decade before.

Working with producer Gavrik Losey, son of Joseph, Massot gives us live footage, whimsically interspersed with Pathé newsreels from the early 60s (not so long before the present-day material) with plummy-voiced chaps earnestly intoning about “young people”. The movie is a madeleine for people of my generation: summoning up the sweat of venues such as London’s Lyceum Ballroom in the Strand, it shudders with the bands’ inexhaustible jogging-on-the-spot energy, the kind of live show where the singer lets rip directly into the ecstatic faces of the people at the front, virtually snogging them.

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