Are Muay Thai and Chicken Panang Awesomer Than Kung Fu and Mongolian Beef?

Asian culture has swept across the postwar American landscape like no other, imparting a culinary and pop legacy almost as profound as American culture has on the rest of the world. China was the early winner in cultural supremacy wars, with takeout on every street corner and kung fu in every grindhouse, trickling down to everything from hip-hop records to animated vegetarian screeds. Japan followed suit, and ninjas, anime, and sushi dominated the scene. Now it might be Thailand's time.

If I recall my Carmen Sandiego correctly, Thailand is the one Asian country that has never been conquered by a foreign invader. So it's a crossroads of its own making, influenced but not coerced. And you can see the counterpoints to Chinese cultural touchstones. In video games, Fei Long vs. Sagat. On menus, Mongolian Beef vs. Panang Chicken. In theaters, Jet Li vs. Tony Jaa. In each case, the Thai version is a bit spicier, a bit more exotic, a bit more alluring. And, just possibly, a bit awesomer.

I'm coming close to heresy to my own principles here. I eat from a Chinese buffet near my office once a week like clockwork, and I've idolized Jet Li ever since I saw Lethal Weapon 4. I don't want to believe that familiarity breeds contempt, but I have to consider the possibility that I'm being tantalized away from true love by a lust for the exotic.

Don't get me wrong -- I'd probably eat at that same Chinese buffet once a week for the rest of my life, but they don't have anything as delicious as a Thai curry. I have a signed poster of Tony Jaa in my apartment, and I'm not sure Jet Li has ever made a movie better than Ong-Bak -- frankly, I'm not sure that anyone has ever made a better martial arts movie. With Li claiming his own retirement from serious martial arts films following the superb Fearless, Jaa's the greatest martial arts star in movies today.

Like Street Fighter's Sagat, Tony Jaa practices Thai boxing, or Muay Thai, a whirlwind of lithe gymnastics, incredible acrobatics, and really painful-looking blows inflicted not with punches but with knee-and-elbow moves with names like "the elephant's tusk." Along with his countryman Dan Chupong, whose skill and charisma perhaps put him on the level of Jean-Claude Van Damme, Jaa's leading a slow wave of Muay Thai movies to our shores.

Leading the nouvelle Thai vague, of course, was Ong-Bak, the first movie I can remember in my lifetime released in theaters featuring Muay Thai. Following was its unofficial sequel, The Protector, reuniting Ong-Bak's director and star. Then came Dan Chupong, a minor character in Ong-Bak, who starred in Born to Fight and Dynamite Warrior, released under Weinstein Films' direct-to-DVD Asian import label. Of course, now that the DVD floodgates have been opened, there's really no limit to how much will come. (And there's no telling how much wheat will be among the chaff.)

Jaa is a force onscreen, but with a soft voice and strangely delicate face on his wiry, chiseled body, very unlike Jet Li's stoic features or Bruce Lee's ferocious intensity. On film, Thai boxing is more acrobatic and less compact than kung fu, and Jaa makes leaps, mid-air body contortions, that barely seem humanly possible. This led Ong-Bak's makers to run a disclaimer with their ad campaign: "no wires, no stunt doubles, no CGI." (The young Jet Li was so fast with his own moves that he either had to be filmed at high speed and then slowed down so that the moves would be visible, or to slow himself down for the benefit of the camera.) The charisma of Jaa's violence is undeniable, hypnotic, breathtaking.

However, staying in shape takes a toll on the production schedules of a would-be international action star, and Jaa's eight-hour-a-day practice regimen makes it hard to squeeze in much acting. He's only starred in two movies in the past five years, and is working on a third -- by comparison, in the same time, Jet Li has starred in four and completed two or three others. If Jaa wants to claim the mantle he so rightly deserves, he'll need to step up the pace.

There's nothing else standing in the way of his dominance, since he's already conquered the air and the screen... I just hope my favorite Chinese buffet understands.

Comments

[Serfie]

Alex-

I have no problems with you promoting Tony Jaa or Muay Thai, but you should at least get your facts straight.

What Tony Jaa does is not Muay Thai. He may use some of the moves, but if you have actually seen a real Muay Thai match in Thailand, you'd know it was a sport, and the boxers are not rolling around like gymnasts and flying like acrobats.

Tony Jaa is an incredible athlete and stunt man who incorporates martial arts from many traditions, but I wouldn't qualify it as Muay Thai.

He made a movie called Tom Yum Gung a couple years ago. I think it was panned at the box office.

In the US, Muay Thai is a sport and has become part of the WBF or WBA, so you should go see a match and see the difference.

[AlexRemington]

Tom Yum Goong was released in the US as "The Protector," with a new soundtrack by the RZA. I loved it, but you're right, it didn't do great in theaters -- only $12 million in the US. (Of course, that's better than most international films.)

I don't know much about Muay Thai, frankly, only what I've seen in Street Fighter and in Tony Jaa movies, which is, obviously, not the true form. But it's a blast to watch, and I hope that Jaa, and Dan Chupong, and Prachya Pinkaew (director of The Protector and Ong-Bak), and Panna Rittikrai (director of Born to Fight, and Tony Jaa's mentor) can continue to make more movies and bring Muay Thai-inspired fight choreography to American shores.

[Serfie]

I think it is cool that you are promoting Tony Jaa and his talent.

Muay Thai is a very important and sacred sport to Thai people, however, so I think it important to distinguish between what he does in movies and the real sport.

Personally, I don't care what you call it, but if you can make the distinction, especially if you want to develop friendships with Thais, they will appreciate your affection for their culture.

[TheEnticer]

you are incorrect ever heard of Nepal? Or Bhutan? Never been conquered.... Burma by it's virtue of being in India was part of Britain however never conquered.

[Serfie]

You have no idea what you are talking about.

Burma was an independent kingdom for centuries before Britain conquered it and incorporated it into the India Raj.

[AlexRemington]

Thanks for correcting me.

[larry278]

As my Thai associates say, "We Thai harder.". The food of Thailand is spicy at times. I prefer the food my Thai friends prepare to a Thai restaurant's fare. Thai restaurant food could be used in an IED.

[JScott]

Don't take a Chinese Buffet as Chinese Food-that's a Chinese American invention and most of them are not that good nor particularly healthy.

[AlexRemington]

Oh, I know that they're not healthy, and I know that it's nowhere near the peak of Chinese culinary achievement. But God, it's delicious.

[LoRiseAntlers]

Tony Jaa is incredible!The guy is a walking shitstorm of death in all his movies.