"The story of "BEYOND RANGOON" has several different levels and elements in it," explains John Boorman, who himself has traveled through Burma extensively, studying the country's people and politics before beginning principal photography in February, 1994. "Burma is a beautiful country, and the people are very gentle," says Boorman, "but they are completely torn apart by the fascist regime in power. This story is about the nature of loss, as Laura unexpectedly comes to a country suffering an internal agony and meets people whose loss mirrors her own. Here is this beautiful young woman whose life has been devastated. But she discovers that, through the Buddhist concept of compassion and loving kindness, she can talk about it for the first time and perhaps move beyond her own tragedy."
"This is a powerful adventure about real people in extraordinary circumstances," adds producer Barry Spikings. "Today, with immense changes going on in the world, many feel lost, cut off from their roots. Family life has eroded. People are searching for a meaning to life and, in their own way, that's what Laura and U Aung Ko are doing. They're searching for redemption, some emotional place in which to live life again."
From the beginning, Boorman, Spikings, and fellow producer Eric Pleskow knew that it would be impossible to film any portions of "BEYOND RANGOON" in today's Burma, which is still ruled by an iron-fisted military junta. The logical alternative seemed to be Malaysia, where several other film production companies -- including the French film "Indochine" -- had already met with success. With jungles, mountains, rivers, waterfalls, padi fields, ancient railways, colonial towns and ethnic villages, Malaysia contained all the right physical elements.
"Barry Spikings and I decided on Malaysia for two very important reasons," explains Boorman. "First, the Malaysian people physically resemble the Burmese, certainly more than you'd find in Thailand. Secondly, George Town on Penang is the only place, outside of some parts of India such as Bombay, where you could get colonial architecture that was similar to Rangoon. These were the main factors, but we also knew Malaysia would present some extraordinary locations."
