能楽 X Thai Film Director Apichatpong (Tropical Malady)

When reading Apichatpong's message "be simple and be yourself", I can't help but think it is merely a non-literal translation of "初心忘るべからず".   

# 円の時間流れ
In both cases, time does not flow in straight line like an arrow, but in a circle, which continues endlessly and forms a sphere, with not only length, but areas, and density due to the relativity and connectivity of each moment. In the film, you never know the temporal moment you are watching. The film always makes you wonder, is it the past, the future, the present or someone's dream dream or some community's collective dream, which we can call mythology. 

Moreover, this time flow without a authoritative starting and ending points make it possible for the audience to delve into the film at any cut. The start of the film does not fill, so it feels just equally strange if you start watching halfway.

# Non-Existence Director
in the film, every episodes is from a real story or hearsay, or an ancient tale. The director uses the word "conceived by" rather than "directed by" probably because he believes what he did at the best is patching disconnected pieces, like making a collage. The same for Zeami, who does not create new story, but only converting existing stories such as 平家物語 into a "play", which composed of sounds, movements, atmosphere (囃子).

The problem (advantage) of non-authorship is the lack of a clear message. Both Apichatpong and Zeami even try to obscure any clear message might be captured by the viewers by distancing where it is supposed to be a close-up and non-expression and self-containment when it comes to the climax.

On the one hand, this puzzles the audience, but on the other hand, it leaves the viewers freedom (the true freedom not the freedom when there is no choice) to decide their own feeling. 

Just like the 民藝 needs 無心. Probably only the void of authorship and the lack of any attempt to create, can a great fiction can be created, which also leading to a non-duality of fiction and non-fiction, reality and mythology. 

Apichatpong message of film-making: be simple and be yourself. I can't help but thinks he is saying "初心忘るべからず" in the 21st century. 

# "Dirty" Religion and "Ethereal" Sexuality 
AP presents religions not with a sacred holy aura. Rather, his Buddhism is naturally mixed with desires and pretense, the impurity and evilness embedded in humane nature. Whereas, all the sexual implication in the film are so delicate and platonic, which forms a direct contract with the energy and noise of the wild forest and disordered street.

Similarly, it is no rarity for Zeami to "disparage" monk. There are times such as 桜川 when the temple is the agency of child-trafficking, and there are also times the monks purposefully stimulate the unfortunate to fall into unfathomable despair and 狂い so that form an "unusual" view, just like beating a stubborn lion but not allow it to die. Moreover, sexuality is often presented in the metaphor of wet clothes along with unearthly and temporal shadows of flowers and leaves.