The Last Executioner

I first read about Chavoret Jaruboon in his Bangkok Post obituary in May 2012. What came across to me was that he was clearly an ordinary man who led an extraordinary life. For a man who wanted to be a rock’n’roll singer, becoming a prison executioner would seem like an unlikely vocation. This is a man who went from holding a guitar to holding a gun - it was as if at times, he was living a double life. In his later years he had even become a minor celebrity in Thailand, as a guest on gameshows and chat shows, celebrated for performing his duties in taking the lives of 55 condemned prisoners. It was perhaps for Chavoret, fame for all the wrong reasons. But yet Chavoret had led his life with a sense of duty, pride and diligence for his job, not once questioning why or how the condemned came to end up on death row. How does a man given with such a task of taking so many lives reconcile with his karma? This was initially what interested me most in making a film inspired by the story of his life. But then after speaking to his widow and family, I realized there were different layers to this man. Not only was he a dutiful servant of the state, but he was also a wonderful husband and a loving family man. After all, raising his family in many ways, was the reason he became an executioner. It paid more bills than playing the guitar would, but it ultimately led to living with demons inside his head. Often troubled by these ‘spirits‘ that haunted him, Chavoret turned to monks for moral guidance, seeking to make amends for his acts of killing. It is as if his karma came around to punish him in the end, with cancer that took his own life after much suffering. Don Linder’s screenplay tells the story of Chavoret’s extraordinary life with much panache, illustrating his inner turmoil and conflicted efforts to reconcile with his karma.