Product Details

• Directors: Robert Millis
• Format: Closed-captioned, Color, DVD, NTSC
• Language: English
• Region: All Regions
• Aspect Ratio: 1.33:1
• Number of discs: 1
• Rated: NR (Not Rated)
• Studio: Sublime Frequencies
• DVD Release Date: June 20, 2006
• Run Time: 78 minutes
• Average Customer Review: 4.5 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (2 customer reviews)
• ASIN: B000FNNI3S
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #289,387 in Movies & TV (See Top 100 in Movies & TV)

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

1 of 1 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars an Isaan Mardis Gras, November 20, 2007

By 

dig-it-the-most "dig-it-the-most" (New York) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Phi Ta Khon: Ghosts of Isan (DVD)

Music, parades, masks, dancing, and celebration. This is just like Mardis Gras.

Video is well produced and the music well recorded. Check out the khaen, the Laotian free-reed mouth organ. They are playing it with western grooves and electric guitars, and it has an exciting sound.

4.0 out of 5 stars Go buy this. now., June 10, 2011

By 

Robert P. Beveridge "xterminal" (Lakewood, OH) - See all my reviews
(HALL OF FAME REVIEWER)    (VINE VOICE)    (REAL NAME)   

This review is from: Phi Ta Khon: Ghosts of Isan (DVD)

<strong>Phi Ta Khon: Ghosts of Isan</strong> (Rob Millis, 2006)

When I first picked up a copy of this at the local rummage shop, I didn't equate the name of Rob Millis with the band Climax Golden Twins, of whom I'm a longtime fan (and whose soundtrack for the 2001 film <em>Session 9</em> remains some of my favorite film music of all time), but when someone made that connection for me when I was talking this movie up to my more musically-inclined friends, it made perfect sense. For while <em>Phi Ta Khon</em> is ostensibly a documentary about the festival of the same name, this is a movie that's entirely saturated by music. In fact, the music really does as good a job, if not better, at putting forth what I believe is the actual subject of this documentary: how the festival is changing with modern times. It starts off indigenous, traditional, but as the film goes on it becomes more modern, incorporating electric guitars and becoming more danceable in the way we, as modern first-world citizens, would think of danceable music. And there is an ineffable sadness to this, but I think part of that is lost on an American audience given that no matter how modern the music gets, it's still sufficiently alien to American ears that you're still basking in the wonder of it all long after the film ends.

This is absolutely wonderful, and the only reason its rating is so low is that there are two problems with it that were dictated more by the subject matter than they were by the film itself. The first is that it's a vertical market item; music fans (and I'm talking about real hardcore music fans, rather than "I like listening to the radio") are going to get a lot more out of this than most, and, quite simply, it's way too damned short, clocking in at less than eighty minutes. It could have been twice as long and it would've still been too short, as far as I'm concerned. You've gotta see this. *** 1/2