Rating: D+
Dir: Kam Chanty
Star: Sovan Makar, Dan Monika
a.k.a. Nieng arp
This was originally slated for inclusion in our 31 Days of Vampires feature from October 2023, but proved surplus to requirements there. It then sat around my hard-drive for the best part of two years, in large part because the IMDb gives the running time as 151 minutes. Turns out that’s a slight exaggeration. The feature runs a “mere” 128, but is followed by 23 minutes of bloopers, and messages of appreciation from the cast and crew. Though it remains more than two hours, is definitely a test of stamina, and was a film I ended up having to watch in three installments. While an interesting concept, based on Cambodian folklore, the execution is not very good – I suspect often literally amateur.
The legend in question is the ap, which as discussed earlier is a creature found in several Eastern Asian countries. Typically, they are vampiric creatures that can separate their head and intestines from their body, and fly about looking for victims on whom they can feast. Here, one such monster happens to be around when the pregnant Maya is the victim of a brutal attack in her rural village, resulting in the death of her boyfriend. The ap seems to turn Maya into a Renfield-like henchwoman, using the basement in her house to house the ap‘s coffin, from which it can roam the country in seek of both food and vengeance on Maya’s attackers. Oh, and sixteen years pass. As they do.
Maya now has a daughter, Paulika, and the house lodges a group of visiting students from Phnom Penh, led by the handsome Satha (Makara). He falls for Paulika, and the attraction is mutual. This is a bit awkward, since it turns out Satha is the descendant of one of Maya’s attackers, and so must die. This kind of shit happens when you wait so long before taking revenge. It may be best served cold, but you then have to kill your daughter’s boyfriend too. A saffron-robed monk shows up, and I thought he was going to be the Van Helsing. No such luck. He offers the Buddhist version of “take two aspirins” i.e. meditate more. Another guy looks to have borrowed Lam Ching-Ying’s eyebrows.
As the top image shows, this is bargain basement stuff on every level. There’s hardly a moment when the ap is convincing, being little more than copy-pasted onto the background. Occasional moments show invention, such as the way it can possess the students or even a mobile phone, only for these to go nowhere much. Proceedings take way too long to get going, with the film in desperate need of trimming. I’d start by removing the desperately unfunny attempts at comedy, such as the fat and gay students. You do have to cut the country some slack – cinema not exactly being a high priority during the Pol Pot era. This is still not very good, and that it proved a local hit testifies mostly to the severe lack of Khmer genre product.