[1] In other words, the narratives explored in Thai queer cinema go beyond heterosexual relationships and the male-female gender binary.
Thai language scholar, Monruedee Laphimon, defines phet as gendered desires, expressions, behaviors, and sexual activities within a spectrum of masculinity and femininity.
[5] Jackson argues that for this reason, while the use of some English LGBT terminology has been adopted in Thailand, the meaning carried by these terms is not the same as their Western counterparts.
[1] Teen dramas, also called melodramas, are another popular sub-genre of queer cinema in Thailand that portray the non-normative relationship and gender expression of teenagers.
[11] The plot revolves around a kathoey cabaret performer, Somying, who falls in love with an aspiring singer who leaves her for a cisgender woman.
The loss of the love of her life leads Somying to commit suicide on stage during her final cabaret performance.
[11] The film’s director, Pisal Akkrasenee, a heterosexual man, stated in an interview that he wanted The Last Song (1985) to capture the tragic experience of being kathoey in Thai society.
[11] Tortured Love (1987), is the sequel to the film The Last Song (1985) and was produced in large part due to the commercial success of its predecessor.
This period marked a turning point for Thai cinema in that films began to reflect new realities and global influences.
[12] In 2000, the underdog sports film about a volleyball team made up Kathoey and gay players, The Iron Ladies, was released.
[6] Thai pop culture scholar, Amporn Jirattikorn, argues that the popularity of this film sub-genre with the heterosexual teen girl demographic has led to the production of many boys' love television dramas in Thailand.
The plot of Love of Siam revolves around the story of Mew (Witwisit Hiranyawongkul) and Tong (Mario Maurer) childhood friends who go on to have a romantic relationship.
[6] Love of Siam was one of the first Thai films to portray a romantic relationship between two teenage boys and one of the first on-screen same-sex kisses.
[11] The plot of The Iron Ladies (2000) stands in contrast to previous films portraying kathoey characters which centered loss and elicited sympathy from the audience.
[3] Queer film scholars Karl Schoonover and Rosalind Galt, argue that through the shift from realism to fantasy just as the two male lead characters are about to kiss in front of a Thai flag, director Apichatpong Weerasethakul highlights the limitations of non-normative sexual desire in modern rural Northern Thailand.
[9] Supernatural, a science fiction film set in a dystopian future, was in some part inspired by George Orwell's novel Nineteen Eighty-Four according to an interview with Pansittivorakul.
[3] Weerasethakul, who is gay himself, is known to explore themes of sexuality, gender, religion, and politics through fantasy and allegory in his films.
Through his films, Pansittivorakul, who is openly gay, commonly explores discrimination and oppression of expressions of gender, sexuality, and religion deemed not acceptable by the Thai State.
[9] He began his filmmaking career in documentary shorts with Private Life (2000) and founded his own production company called Sleep of Reason Films in 2012.