Chanthaly

2012 DramaHorror 98 minutes Directed by Mattie Do

About Chanthaly

Chanthaly lives shut in with her father in Vientiane and has a hereditary heart condition. She thinks her dead mother is trying to give her a message. A change in her medicine stops the visions. She then has to decide whether to risk the illness in order to hear what her mother was saying.

Cast & crew

More about Chanthaly

Mattie Do directed. Christopher Larsen wrote the screenplay, photographed the film, and edited it. Douangmany Soliphanh, who plays the father, is also credited as a writer and producer. The whole picture was shot in Do’s house in Vientiane. It runs 98 minutes and was shown at the 2012 Luang Prabang Film Festival and at Fantastic Fest in 2013.

Themes

  • A house she does not leave
  • Medicine that stops the mother
  • A message she may not survive to hear
  • Chanthaly
  • father
  • dead mother
  • heart medicine
  • Vientiane
  • ghost

Making

Do and Larsen produced it with Soliphanh. There is no separate studio set. The house is the location.

Look

Christopher Larsen shot the film inside Mattie Do’s house in Vientiane, with no exterior company of sets.

Notes

  • Amphaiphun Phimmapunya, a pop singer, plays Chanthaly.
  • Soukchinda Duangkhamchan plays Thong. Khouan Souliyabapha plays Bee. Soulasath Souvanavong plays Keovisit.
  • It is the first horror film written and directed entirely in Laos, and the first Lao feature directed by a woman.
  • The language is Lao.
  • Raw production footage was posted to the Internet Archive under the title Chanthaly Open Source Project.

Scenes

  • Chanthaly sees her mother in the house.
  • The new medicine ends the visions.
  • She weighs hearing the message against the heart condition.

Also available

  • Internet Archive (Chanthaly.Open.Source.Project.Footage-MANGO), production footage