Fai Gam Prae (2020)

Cotton In Silk

Okay, first couple (the people who are standing on the poster pic... though they are not touching each other and both are touching other people, lol) meets at the airport. Not that they necessarily travel abroad. Being thai, they often fly to Chiang Mai as by train it might take 15 hours, lol. Anyways, it's always pitty when people play somebody else as they could actually be given what they want had they played straight. Like this couple, both girl & guy lie to the other side as to who they are and therefore they don't learn they are actually on the same boat. Meaning they're not rich heir(ess), they're just their from orphanage adopted "sibling", in reality their servant.

They're both 'Cotton In Silk', which is the english title of this series and it's brilliant. I'll be definitely using it and not "Fai Gam Prae".

The guy is New Chaiyapol Pupart, and I can't be impressed with him as I've already watched lakorns with him since 13 years back, so he's old for me, he's 30 here, lol. The girl is new to me though she's 28: I just didn't happen to watch anything she was in. She's pretty (not nang'ek level, though), she's got a freckle right on a tip of her nose, she's mostly seen smirking (in this role), she married Toni Rakkaen which is about the most interesting thing about her.

Second couple is another thirty guy, whom I don't remember from anywhere plus Marina Sadanun, whom I don't remember from anywhere... Though, with HER I know I watched lakorns she was in and I know she's Margie Rasri's sister, but: a) she doesn't resemble her AT ALL b) she is forgettable and THAT'S WHY I can't remember her, lol. Actually, the second couple isn't a couple, as...

The "first couple" gets together very early and after unconvincing bed scene with blatant fake kiss they decide to switch and date the people who are those sitting on the poster pic. Well, mostly because they discover they're BOTH poor and they need to trick somebody else into marriage. Subsequently they each go for the heir/ess of the family the other one got adopted into (they're both same sex as their superior "sibling"), as they can provide each other information how to seduce their target, and also they both find it satisfactory. From their point of view, the people who treat their adopted "family members" like slaves deserve to be deceived anyways.

This drama - despite "unconventional" leads who are far from docile, super nice types and do try to get even with the "filthy rich" - overflows nevertheless with blatant product placement for luxury shoes, bags, clothes, cars, ridiculously overpriced D&G wallets, etc... Same conflict lies within its characters.

The orphans are supposed to be smarter than the spoiled rich brats, yet they spend all money they earn on appearances instead of savings or smart investments into their future. Or at least the freedom to buy themselves out. After years (decades) of being chained in rich households, seeing the solution in marrying themselves without love into rich households doesn't seem the right fit for these characters. If they both are capable people who excel at work it would be way more understandable had they desired to make themselves independent on ANYONE, which is something marriage (happy or unhappy) is NOT. But then this story probably could not progress to the plot it was aiming for. Meaning each brat marrying one orphan.

Music does sound updated. From the old "generic bacground music", to... some kind of new generic background music, lol. "Congratulations" to that achievement in 2020. Nevertheless, the familiar random, circulating usage of it soon gets very repetitive, just as something from 20 years ago.

When a rich girl falls in love with a poor boy in this drama, her mother is actually right about him being after her money. Nobody loves her just for being cute and innocent (she's big fan of tv series, of course). Guys plain say she's dumb. (And smirk at her "taste" in clothes.) The mother does scold and humilate the poor girl like in oldschool lakorns, but also does see that she is more capable to work in her firm than her own daughter. And apparently wishes her own kid to be at least bit smart like her. You could say it's another cliche that rich brats should be all stupid, but in this show one can understand they are just lazy to work hard as they never have to. It's funny how everyone just plainly thinks about money. The parents are annoyed when their kid chooses someone without money, the poor go on dates with the rich for money, the only one acting upon emotion is the shallow rich girl with empty head in the clouds. Seems we do not have anyone who is just a pitiful victim, here...

The 2 girls who grew up together shall both marry: one of them rising thus in her status, while the other... Let's say the orphan girl now really has a good reason to smirk at the arrogant mother. The mother realizes she should have gotten rid of her but too late. It actually doesn't make much sense she should adopt her from orphanage if she just wanted a servant. Only brainwashing organizations need to do that, lol. Same with the orphan boy, the only thing the family actually did was that they raised someone wanting to get even. Besides the plot being silly, skinship among the cast (who is far from unexperienced) is nonexistent.

As this seems to be one of the coldest "passionate lakorns" I watched, we at least concentrate on the lessons for the characters. Yeah, it's not so easy to come and take over someone's wealth by marrying them, today. Generations have developed measures to protect their rich kids against exactly that. So, both the orphans stand against well prepared parents. Neither of the orphans therefore actually accomplishes this, nevertheless they do exchange houses to live in, now. There is a scene where they each secretly visit the (now abandoned) room of the other. But then they have to both sleep with their rich spouse, without having enjoyed it much and without getting much in return. Just posh new roof over their head... Which is not their own, again. I'm afraid the orphans haven't actually gained much, except the kind of life that they once suffered through already. As I originally pointed out.

The orphans watch each other with someone else and end up having a heated argument. Orphan girl is "concerned" about rich girl, which is unexplicable, because she certainly doesn't owe her any friendship. It's a jealousy scene with a "violently passionate" kiss which the actors are unable to portray. So it's not only a stupid scene, also it looks like he's trying to choke her or strangle her. Seemed like the production team needed to regroup and assess whether they were shooting a drama, or a comedy, or a parody. Nevertheless, the same girl appears in the same situation with her new rich husband the next scene. I say that when the girl looks equally unwilling to kiss THE guy and the other guy, then the lakorn has a problem.

Obviously rich girl is about to learn her lesson about common life the first second she's to live without any servant. We watch her being unable as much as to pack her own things. What I did NOT get was why the orphan girl - beside that she kept assisting the rich girl's mother (btw. Dee Chanana is the only one of the cast who bothered to actually deliver acting performance) - came to play the unpaid maid for the rich girl, at this stage. SHE didn't owe that to her and spoiled my only fun.

When I reached 3/4 of the series, I really ceased to understand all the characters. Orphan girl not only isn't legally wedded wife, her rich guy says in public that she's only an acquaintance. On the top of that, he starts to beat her? Rich girl comes to rich party in low status dress and with a low status guy and her rich "friends" partly mock her, but still talk to her. Perhaps Carissa Springett's call girl is the only one with a clear motive.

Truth is this was nonsensical all along, only now it involves violence the more it stands out. When the orphan girl is kept prisoner in the rich house literally and not just figuratively, it's all kinda more stupid. While orphan boy keeps living just as poor life as before, only now burdened with dependent airhead "wifey" he doesn't even want. Scenes with him having to raise from the bed while injured because she won't be moved to learning how to boil water are bordering on black comedy. It's funny how he cannot control her because in the end of the day she's just too thick(/skinned) like the rich boy.

Rich girl experiences being hungry for the first time in her life, nevertheless still that doesn't cause her to think (also for the first time in her life:) Instead, she gets together with her rich-circle friends, surrounding herself with yet more airheads. Being completely empty headed and just waiting who puts their whatever ideas for whatever reason in, rich girl "decides" to have a baby and become a parent. Before as much as growing up herself, first.

Orphan girl & orphan boy's plans are failing. They get together mainly because they have no one else. It begins to look like this is their warped love story, given a modern twist where they are trying to forget each other and marry rich, but they are not even successful in THAT. Instead of novel-like life, they encounter people who are all bussiness, or all stupid.

When things are at stage where orphan girl would be better off if she simply skipped town (she's not really married anyways), she doesn't and gets raped by her "husband" which in reality isn't that different from when she slept with him before for money only and maybe she finally begins to realize. Also orphan boy, while more or less considering to really have a baby with the rich girl and thus finally get into rich house, is definitely realizing that such life would be only continuation of what he already lived before.

Rich boy acts like evil now, but one wonders why he even bothers. If he's rich he can have hundred pretty girls. Even if he likes to punch them in the face. Orphan girl, who used to be so energetic, acts bewildered. In that state, she only seems to be anxious whether she did hurt the trust of the rich girl, who comes at her only because she got programmed to play the possessive wifey, now. (As if we didn't have enough stupid main characters, we deal with the rich girl's moron friends more and more.)

There's a funny scene where orphan girl ends up in the condo she wanted so very much. She sheds a tear in the scene, nevertheless we never saw any kind of real relationship between her and rich boy so it can't be a moving scene. Orphan boy is also getting what he wanted and is about as "happy" about it as orphan girl is. Funny how this is actually a good cautionary tale about why it's important that you love the person you choose to live with. How love helps you to get over the mundane struggle and give it some meaning. Orphan boy doesn't have that, so he's now left only with the same pretense he invested in the relationship, to give him comfort back. Poetic justice.

On rare occasion we get to watch something fun, I have to again mention the character of the call girl. She actually does the same and is the same as the orphan girl, only in more nakedness (pun intended:) It used to be important to orphan girl to feel superior to "simple" call girl, unfortunatelly, she acted less smart than her, and ended up with less dignity than a call girl. Also a lesson.

There is an absurd scene in which rich boy starts beating up orphan girl with rich girl's mother watching. That scene is so weird for several reasons. Rich girl's mother herself treated orphan girl like dirt in the past, yet even she looks concerned for her now. She also wished the rich boy to become her son in law in the past. But her daughter prefered orphan boy to him which caused the mother and daughter to separate. Now orphan girl is the only one by rich mother's side. It's all so twisted it's funny. Rich boy now abuses orphan girl in public no matter who is watching. Still, it doesn't feel really dramatic. I feel the rich boy's character makes no sense from any angle. Just why he should be so obsessed to own each minute of orphan girl's time - after he almost/had quite lukewarm relationship with her to begin with - is beyond me. Perhaps a better looker and better actor was needed for this role to work, than this Iang Sittha. Perhaps not.

The whole thingy with him abusing her with the public watching and recording it on their little phones seemed yet one more pitiful attempt of this show's writer to create "big drama" effect out of nothing... The characters and their relationships were unconvincing since episode ONE, not since the beating. Forgive me to find it really ridiculous for rich boy to LOCK UP orphan girl in his rich house. Where would she go? She didn't have a single baht. She always wanted to get INTO rich house, not out... And even if she now wanted out, when orphan boy offered her to run away with him, she didn't and chose to play a martyr (just like she chose to stay employed by rich girl's mother, or to continue playing well wishing helper to rich girl).

The comedy continues after it's revealed it was orphan boy who called police into the house owned by rich boy's father, who of course got rid of them with a smile. I'm sorry but I was not surprised and I was just an audience. Just what did orphan boy expect, knowing the man his whole life? Then next morning orphan boy goes to work: at rich boy's father's office.

What I liked about the last episode was, that finally we were done with all the orphan girl's plans. She didn't succeed, she wasn't a good person kind of nang'ek, but I didn't mind it. She said to orphan boy that looking at him was like looking at her own reflection, that was a good line. No matter the injustice, orphan girl was finally ready to move on and start her own life, like I honestly wanted her to from the beginning. There is a scene where she goes to say goodbye to rich girl's mother. Truth is, also her mother. A cruel kind of mother, but still. I felt the goodbye was in place. Again, Dee Chanana was absolutely great.

After that, orphan girl & orphan boy randomly meet at a hotel bar and both the empty headed rich girl & rich boy (I almost forgot about them by then) get hysterical when hearing about it. I must say THAT I didn't like, that I was tired of. Like AT LAST, give it a rest, lol. When rich boy takes a gun out of his drawer (seriously) I wanted to turn the series off prematurely. Why watch another 30 minutes if it's getting THIS dumb? Better let it end.

At the bar, orphan boy is getting tipsy and says wistfully to orphan girl: If only we didn't lie to each other the first day we met, what could we be now? Which was funny because in fact had he said to her he was poor just like her she would not slept with him, lol. So, let the past be. They both learned their lesson they needed. Then, rich girls comes to have her "dramatic" confrontation with orphan girl (so tired of that by now) complaining how could she still hang out with orphan boy after all she did for her? This being final episode, I guessed orphan girl would be able to say something back, like what about everything SHE did for her? How she was her slave and how she sacrificed the guy she liked. But no, she just begs at rich girl's feet. Rich girl doesn't believe her and leaves. Maybe if orphan girl got angry, that would open rich girl's eyes. Either way I just didn't care about the empty character, in fact I wouldn't mind if rich boy/girl were not present in final episode. This wasn't their story.

Still, after the girls confrontation, we then have the boys, too... I felt like skipping that scene before it started. Nevertheless, in the same bar these two have fought once already, orphan boy says again, that he met orphan girl first, that he was with her first... Yeah, we already watched that some episodes back. Seriously, where the scriptwriter went, the one that was supposed to write FINAL episode of this? I was afraid that this would never end, now. Rich boy acted exactly the same, like he was stuck in the time loop. Was he real? Somebody turn his hologram off, lol. Obviously no one heard me so the boys have a fight like last time, people are recording them on their phones. Like last time. Oh, now we have this "perfected" by rich boy drawing a GUN. Just perfect. If anything about this series STILL was not kitchy and corny enough.

But at least the final scene with rich boy & his father was funny. Comical how rich boy got livid even over a paid girl. Clearly confirmed it was ALWAYS about ownership with any girl. Also funny because all his paid girls were paid by his father's money, he never made a cent. So if he wanted to look at things that way, they were more his father's than his. Still, being completely empty headed, he forgets from whom he kept receiving the whole time, who bothered to help him stay out of jail, and assaults his father. It kept piling up: the overwhelming stupidity of rich boy's character had no end. Thank heavens this lakorn had.

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