Some films are a form of wish fulfilment. In the case of Pat Boonnitipat’s debut, the clue is in the title: How to Make Millions Before Grandma Dies. “I promised my grandma millions if the movie was a success at the box office,” says the 34-year-old Thai director, speaking from Los Angeles by video call. “Of course, at first it was a joke. I thought I would lose money.”
Unexpectedly, though, How to Make Millions Before Grandma Dies has been a cultural supernova in Asia — the most successful Thai film ever in countries across the region. In a local film industry that thrives on horror and comedy blockbusters, Boonnitipat knew a family drama was an outlier, “not just in terms of plot, but style, too”.
If the title suggests something cosy and soft-hearted, the film itself has a harder-edged premise. When university dropout M (Putthipong “Billkin” Assaratanakul) finds out his grandmother Mengju (Usha Seamkhum) has cancer, he puts aside his aspirations of becoming a video game streamer to act as her carer.