Following the tradition, Kham takes great care in raising the animals and grows up forming close relations with his elephant, Por Yai, and its calf, Kohrn.

However, the elephants are now in the hands of Johnny, a Vietnamese gangster who runs Tom Yum Goong Otob, a Thai restaurant in Sydney, Australia.

Sydney police officers Mark, a Thai-Australian, and his partner Rick corner the thief, who holds Kham at gunpoint.

With Pla's help, Kham enters Tom Yum Goong Otob, where he fights into the VIP area and reaches the dining hall at the top.

Enraged, Kham beats up his opponents and enters the storage area, where it contains various exotic animals ready to be butchered and eaten.

After arriving, Kham is confronted by three assassins: a fierce capoeirista, a sword-wielding wushu expert, and T.K., a giant wrestler.

Finding himself with Kohrn in a vast room, Kham is shown the skeleton of Por Yai, encrusted with jewels as a gift to Madame Rose.

Kohrn is thrown through a glass wall, and Kham is knocked into the elephant ornament, causing two leg bones to fall off.

and the other wrestlers by using the sharp ends of the bones to slice their tendons; where he stops Madame Rose before she can escape in a helicopter, and they both crash into the room below.

Compared to Ong-Bak: Muay Thai Warrior, which was noted for its lack of wirework and CGI, this movie uses CGI in several scenes, from the obvious (helicopter scene, and an entirely computer-animated dream sequence), to the subtle (a glass window shattering in the four-minute steadicam long take that follows Jaa up several flights of stairs as he dispatches thug after thug in dramatic fashion).

The taekwondo sequence, featuring Dean Alexandrou and Daniel O'Neill is shown in part in nearly all promotional trailers for the film, but was cut due to unknown reasons from the final release.

In the U.S. release of Tom-Yum-Goong, where it was named The Protector, there is a deleted scene of Kham beginning his ambush of the house party by the criminal group who stole his elephants.

The Weinstein Company purchased the U.S. distribution rights for Tom-Yum-Goong and retitled it The Protector (also the name of a 1985 film starring Jackie Chan).

It was released in January 2007 on DVD on The Weinstein Company's Dragon Dynasty label in a two-disc set that includes both the U.S. edit and the original Thai version of the film.

[4] For the US theatrical cut, the film's length was reduced by at least 25 minutes, going so far as to trim down some of the fight scenes, even though it was given an "R" rating restricting audiences to people aged 17 and over.

Some parts of the missing footage (including cuts to the "bone breaker" fight and Madame Rose envisioning herself in a red dress as queen) appeared in the U.S. trailer and TV Spots.

The critical consensus reads, "Despite some impressive fight scenes, this trimmed-down version of the Thai action pic is an off-putting mix of scant plot, choppy editing, and confusing subtitles and dubbing.

"[9] High On Films gave a positive review and wrote "Tom-Yum-Goong ranks amongst the finest exhibitions of martial arts in cinema, and is definitely worth a shot.

"[10] Combat sports and striking analyst Jack Slack has written that Tony Jaa's multiple attackers scene in the film is "the best fight in movie history".