Last year, Thailand was at the centre of international attention for a story of hope and survival when a local youth football team known as the Wild Boars became trapped in a cave in Chiang Rai after heavy rain and flooding. Through local and international outreach, two weeks after the boys went missing, each and every Wild Boar emerged from the cave, weary but alive.
The inspiring story is now being immortalised in a full-length feature film by Thai-English director Tom Waller, its release date set to November 28. The Cave is a dramatic retelling of the events with most of the scenes shot on location at Tham Luang. Waller, who is responsible for a few important films about Thailand including Sop-mai-ngeap (2011) and Petchakat (2014), worked closely with real rescuers of the Wild Boar mission, even featuring a few of them in the film playing themselves. The director has said that he decided to make a film “about the volunteer spirit of the rescue,” rather than tell the story through the eyes of the lost boys as many netizens called for.
Watch the official trailer for The Cave below:
The team had gone on an exploration after football practice, a common routine for the adventure- and nature-loving boys. It wasn’t even their first time visiting this particular cave, Tham Luang, Thailand’s fourth most extensive cave system that stretches 10 kilometres beneath a mountain range border Thailand and Myanmar. However, it had been raining for the last few days, resulting in a flash flood that blocked the cave’s entrance as the 12 boys and their coach were inside. They were forced to go deeper to find a pocket of air.
There was no question among the community where the boys had gone missing; bikes, bags and a few football shoes were found right outside the cave. The question was whether they were alive and how to get them out.
Thai military bring water pumps to the cave on July 6, 2018 in Chiang Rai, Thailand (Photo: Courtesy of Lauren DeCicca/Getty Images)
