There’s nothing like a good monster movie. Of course, your local streaming service will have some considerable say over what you might watch. Amazon Prime is likely my biggest influencer because I can’t afford the movies on my watch list and there’s a monster-load of “free” content. Still, I fear something may have been lost in translation. I wasn’t in the mood for anything too heavy, and The Lake thumbnail had a retro-Godzilla vibe to it. The fact that it’s a Thai horror film certainly enhanced the appeal. But I’m not sure I understand what it’s supposed to be saying. The dialog translation wasn’t, I suspect, very accurate. More than that, however, I’m in no position to judge cultural tastes for a culture I know primarily through cuisine. There’s more than a rampaging monster here, but it doesn’t translate well.
There’s a monster in the lake, shown pretty clearly early on. It kills several villagers, perhaps for disturbing its egg. A bunch of characters are thrown at the viewer—a family where the brother psychically bonds with the young monster (there’s a bigger, madder, mother monster), a researcher and his assistant, a detective and, quite late in the movie, his daughter, a police chief and his daughter, and none of them have enough screen time for us to figure out who the story’s about. The monster doesn’t seem evil, although it killed several people at the start. The police chief evacuates people to the temple and some Buddhist priests show up. There’s religion and horror worth exploring here, but the dubbing calls the temple a “church” more than once.
The story largely seems to be about family. The initial family, after losing a couple of members, reunites. The detective’s daughter dies after he has reconciled with her in the ambulance. The female police officer reveals near the end that the chief is her father. (The researcher doesn’t seem to be related to his assistant, but they drop out of the plot.) It’s difficult to tell if this is a bad movie or simply a cultural gap that puts real understanding beyond the reach of those in such a different realm. From my viewpoint it was a movie not unlike the Godzilla films with which I grew up. In other words, better than sleeping away an afternoon but not worth putting too much brain power behind trying to comprehend. Technically it was a movie better than I could hope to make. Some of the cinematography was quite nice. I’m just not sure if I understood what was being translated or not.
