By the standard of any other MMFF, Mano Po: 7 would fare pretty well. Quality wise it would probably end up at the middle or near the top of any MMFF festival of old. But times have changed, and while by itself it remains a halfway decent drama, Mano Po 7 is merely another iteration of the same themes.
Mano Po 7 chronicles the various problems plaguing a Chinese-Filipino family. There's the overbearing father, the mother with commitment issues, the rebellious son and the daughter rebelling against the father.
The drama is relatively subdued this time around, and it becomes the film's greatest weakness. The film doesn't really have a dramatic anchor to hold on to; while a lot of the conflicts should center around Richard Yap's character, he's a pretty decent father compared to parents of Mano Pos past. Much of the family conflict is resolved relatively swiftly, the characters lack any sort of meaningful backstory, and it all feels superficial and shallow. When the drama should be the most important aspect of the movie, there's a bit of a problem here. A bit of artificial drama is injected near the end, and it feels out of place.
I was hoping for a fresh director to take a new approach with the material, but unfortunately Mano Po's story follows all the familiar story beats of past films, making the whole exercise pretty predictable as far as these things go. Even after the first half hour or so I knew how the movie was going to end. It's all very conventional, and after seven films it might be time to rethink the same tired concept and approach it from a different perspective.
Watching the film puts the final nail in the coffin of the 'Christmas is for kids, e.g., films like this' argument. Mano Po 7 is a drama that is definitely not for kids. A love scene (tastefully done, to be fair) is present, which isn't the most kid friendly of things to put in a movie.
If you've seen the other Mano Po films and want pretty much the same thing, congratulations; you won't be disappointed with this one. But to people like me, this is a film with a formula whose time has passed.
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