The Billionaire

Songyos Sugmakanan's 2011 Thai film is based on the story of a real entrepreneur. Top is a nineteen-year-old student making money selling accounts in online games; his grades are poor, and when his family's debt of forty million baht comes to light the house is put up for sale. His parents leave the country, he stays and tries to build a business, selling chestnuts, failing, then working on packaged fried seaweed. The film does not present success as something that arrives at once, putting concrete obstacles at the centre: shelf life, hygiene in production and the conditions set by a large retail chain. The tone is motivating, but the failures are shown too. It found a wide audience in Thailand. Who it's for: viewers who like entrepreneurial stories and Thai cinema. Who it's not for: anyone expecting a critical view; the film exalts its subject.