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Iron Ladies II
(PG) |
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| Envious teammate Nong (Giorgio Maiocchi) feels left out of the limelight when the volleyball team propels to new-found fame after defeating an arch rival team. Seeing Jung (Chaicharn Nimpoonsawas) as an obstacle to his individual popularity, Nong dumps the Satree Lek with the 3 reserves when offered a star position by a Satree Lek wannabe team. The once bosom friends soon clash on opposite sides of the net, each relentlessly refusing to forgive and forget. Desperate to reunite the players after several fruitless attempts to defeat their rival team, Satree Lek's captain Chai (Jessadaporn Pholdee), also the only heterosexual male in the group, sets off with Jung to Talor, China in search of their old coach, Bee. In their absence, Nong discovers his team's plot to stamp out Satree Lek by using him as a firestarter and is utterly shattered by the deception. Full of regret and betrayal, he kneels tearfully before the team's striker, Mon (Sahaphab Virakamin), to seek forgiveness. Jung and Nong soon meet up in Talor where they discover that Pia (Gokgorn Benjathikul) , now a carberet performer in China, had been the peacemaker between this dispute all along. After heart-to-heart confession, Jung and Nong kiss and make up. The team then returns to Lampang to fight it out with the rival team, competing for the district's championship. Even if you missed the original, part II revisits how the members of Satree Lek met and conquered the doubts and fears over their sexuality. The film fills the audience in on the personal triumphs and failures each player goes through and how they stood up and lived life for themselves and not for the people around them. And sadly, those trips down memory lane are about the only good parts of the movie. Iron Ladies II satisfies the stereotype of mediocrity that people attach to sequels. The storyline is tasteless and the [translated] dialogue predictable. Unlike the previous, there is little effort put in to spice up the conversations with colourful and bone-tickling verse. There is also less action and the final showdown against the opposition was too short and had too few surprising volleyball tactics to be memorable. Instead, a large part of the show emphasises on the Iron Ladies's lives before their resounding fame. If the director Yongyoot Thongkongtoon, who also directed Iron Ladies, is suggesting to produce Iron Ladies III, I recommend he work doubly hard to win its fans back. Though the film may overdose on cross dressing and male prancing, the improvement in some actors' performances has given audiences a reason to watch the otherwise dull show. The 2 leads, Giorgio Maiocchi and Chaicharn Nimpoonsawas, were sensational, bringing in the laughs with their hilarious zero-point jumping and nymphomaniacal sexual desires. They also charm the audience whenever they engage in verbal cat fighting. The 2 characters often quarrel about the dumbest things like who is prettier or who a certain guy they fancy prefers. This is especially a great leap for Chaicharn, who only had his first movie experience in the previous Iron Ladies. My favourite scene is when Chaicharn's Jung was wrapped in a pink Hello Kitty towel up to his chest, complete with a bright pink shower cap after a bath. He tries hard to edge closer to the heterosexual Chai while maintaining his demure and innocent composure, making the audience laugh uncontrollably. But if you missed the movie's predecessor in 2001, I'd say stay home and watch it on VCD. It's better than wasting $8.50 watching a couple of boys in micro-shorts and thick makeup dancing to the beat of "I Will Survive" in the theatres. This is strictly a fans-only movie. |
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