Who wants to see Pleum's face three metres tall?

Published on February 18, 2008

He co-hosts a chat show, he cut an album of him singing and he writes a column for a newspaper.

What else does ML Nattakorn "Pleum" Devakula do?

Now comes Pleum the Movie. (It worked for the Simpsons.)

Pleum makes his acting debut in the lead role in "Tod Rahad Vinyarn" ("Soul's Code"), which opens on February 28. He plays Kanon, a DSI cop who scoffs at the supernatural.

Evidently he's pulling double duty as the film's publicist too, batch-emailing his pals to get them into the theatres. He is, he assures them, Thailand's answer to Brad Pitt, as seen in "Seven".

"That's not an exaggeration," he writes. "Must see it whether you like me or not. This will be one of my legacies of the year to remember."

"Kanon shares many things with the 'real' me," he writes. "He's sceptical about everything and he likes to investigate and track down the facts."

Pleum apparently underwent some training for the role - how to use a gun, how to beat up bad guys and how to belittle subordinates - but he's still modest about his embryonic acting abilities. He's urged his friend to avoid comparing him to veteran stars.

Nevertheless, he told them, they have to catch the film in the theatre, even though he's unable to send everyone invitations to the premiere. No doubt he's got too many friends and the producers want to limit the drain on ticket revenues.

Most importantly, he's telling people, this will be their only chance to see him on the big screen.

"I won't act in any other movie apart from this one - except if the film has a sequel and Kanon is needed to start another case."

There's always a sequel, isn't there? Certainly in Thai politics, with which Pleum is not unfamiliar.

Politics: Keeping families together

The family togetherness embraced in Thai politics - father, son, daughter, step-niece and fifth cousin's chauffeur united in one ministry office, a single tribe serving the entire populace - ought to be heart-warming. But some people are just nags about nepotism.

Thus, when the new Cabinet line-up was announced and there were two Kowsurats on it, reporters started to itch and scratch.

Weerasak Kowsurat is the Chart Thai party-list MP who's become the minister of Tourism and Sports. Sithichai Kowsurat was named deputy Interior minister in the Puea Pandin Party's quota.

So Weerasak shows up at Government House and he's asked right out, "Are you and Sitthichai related?"

"I used to ask my mum about this because we're also from the same district as he is," said the Ubon Ratchathani native. He speculated that they probably do share a lofty branch somewhere on the family tree, but he's never broached the subject with Sithichai. "So far we've only talked about work."

Always helpful, the reporters suggested that, now that they're both in the Cabinet, they have plenty of time to compare DNA.

What a nice story!

But who should they thank for this wonderful reunion of cousins? Thaksin for originally making such a mess of things, the Democrats who protested, the coup generals who stepped in to try and clean up, or the People Power Party for reuniting clans and country?

Noppadon is suddenly no foreigner to praise

As an indices of how well the new government is doing so far, the following text messages were sent to Channel 9's "Pen Pleum" show while host Pleum the Actor was interviewing Noppadon Patama the Foreign Minister.

"In Praise of Noppadon"

"You're my ultimate hero."

"The real genius"

"May you stand and fight for the people forever."

"I like your ideas. I'm so impressed with you, Minister."

"Noppadon - good guy and beautiful mind"

"I never knew you were so brilliant."

"Thailand will have a prime minister named Noppadon in eight years' time."

"Love you, Noppadon!"

"Heaven has eyes."

"You're a brave guy and you dare to fight for what's right."

And that's just a sampling. The compliments kept flowing in throughout the show. Clearly the country is well on its way to reconciliation. Peace and prosperity are at hand. Release the white doves of celebration.

Your daily sex: Teenagers with tusks

Valentine's Day brought its usual wave of hand wringing about teenagers having sex when they should be ... uh ... not having sex. But Thailand wasn't the only place where underage sex was causing an uproar last week.

As flashed globally by the Australian Broadcasting Corp, one of the elephants at Sydney's Taronga Zoo was found to be six months' pregnant - and she's only eight years old! Elephants aren't supposed to be having kids until they're at least 11.

The problem there is that premature pregnancy could put the animal's health at risk. So the zookeepers are making adjustments to the breeding arrangements, but they point out that stopping animals from mating is always tricky and "particularly when they're the size of elephants".

We may be seeing things simplistically here, but surely the job can be done with a pair of watchful eyes and a high-powered water hose. Same with Thai teenagers.

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