In the town of Krabi, a popular tourist destination in southern Thailand, the pre-historic, the recent past and the contemporary capitalist world awkwardly collide. The town’s local folklore and histories are promoted as attractions to foreigners, while the town’s traditional labour force is muted and hidden from the tourists’ eyes. A nameless character, whose identity continually changes, takes us around town to explore various sites that capture Krabi in its current state. These sites uniquely illustrate how Krabi’s folklore are propagated and commodified to fill the need of tourism industry.

Ben Rivers is an artist and filmmaker represented by Kate MacGarry Gallery in London. Rivers won the second EYE Art Film Prize 2016, as well as the FIPRESCI International Critics Prize, 68th Venice Film Festival for his first feature film Two Years At Sea; he received the Baloise Art Prize, Art Basel 42, for Sack Barrow; and the Paul Hamlyn Foundation Award for Artists in 2010. Recent solo shows include Phantoms, Triennale, Milan; Urth, The Renaissance Society, Chicago; Islands, Kunstverein of Hamburg; Earth Needs More Magicians, Camden Arts Centre, London; The Two Eyes Are Not Brothers, Artangel, London and Whitworth Museum, Manchester. His most recent feature film, The Sky Trembles and the Earth is Afraid and the Two Eyes Are Not Brothers, premiered in the main competition at Locarno International Film Festival.



Krabi 2562

1h 34m

Documentary


UK Release : Available on Mubi from 29th May 2020