I Fell Into a K-pop Girl Group Rabbithole (and I am still falling)

Before February 2024 I did not listen in any regular capacity to K-pop. I would occasionally catch a song when it reached the mainstream or when I saw something through the posts of friends on social media, but I don't actively seek songs out. It didn't help that I've heard horror stories about how toxic the fandoms can become and I didn't want any part of that. If you look at my music streaming stats, pop music is usually the least likely thing you'd find on there - for the record, my favorite genres from last year were progressive metal, djent and melodic dubstep. I like a lot of genres, but last year I found myself drawn to rhythmically and sonically complex songs that have some sort of emotional climax. I am also only tangentially aware of pop music in the western world, so my knowledge of music is limited.

But that all changed when the YouTube algorithm showed me a video I'd never seen before. It was this video:

It was a video featuring the members of Kpop group NewJeans debating two topics. The first topic was the one that caught my attention, because it was about the eternal debate of what came first, the chicken or the egg. A member from Team Egg (who I would later learn was Danielle) and a member from Team Chicken (who I would later learn was Hanni) passionately argued about whether dinosaurs were "the first animal to pop out of this Earth." (For the record, I'm with Team Egg on this one, and I think Danielle and her teammate Haerin made a persuasive argument.)

It was funny, it was entertaining, and I found myself wanting to know more. At this point I hadn't even heard a single note from NewJeans' music. A month with change later I had listened to the discographies (and watched the videographies) of three groups and overall changed my impression of K-pop as a genre. Some of these songs are now in my rotation. I am a changed man.

If you look at the discographies of these groups, unless they've been around for a while (or are extremely prolific) they actually don't make a lot of music. Korean pop releases are unique in that each release (or 'comeback') is usually a short EP or single consisting of a handful of songs that these groups will promote and perform for a period of time. These songs are extremely catchy and are engineered for the social media age (some more than others, more on that later.) In this promotional period, groups do a ton of variety content, whether in their own channels or spaces or on traditional variety shows - as much as they are singers and dancers, they are also expected to be entertainers. This is supplemented by a small sub industry of fans who do edits and compilation videos of these variety show appearances, translate them for international audiences, and hype up the group during and in between these promotional phases. Their contributions to growing fan spaces is not to be underestimated as that's how I got into this mess in the first place.

The music can be incredibly diverse, drawing from (and sometimes appropriating, but that's a topic for another day) many different musical styles, depending on the group's 'concept.' In the end, the finished product is the Ivan Drago of music, if music (aside from what I hope is still an earnest piece of artistic expression) was also scientifically manufactured for charts and virality. You will find yourself humming these hooks at random parts of the day, and many of these songs are made almost solely out of them.

In this short piece I'll be talking about three K-pop or adjacent groups that I've been following for the past month or so. No, I don't actually have any biases, I'm too old for that shit, I'd be happy to cook BBQ for any of these ladies at my hypothetical daughter's request or something. As I have limited knowledge of music in general expect takes on these songs that may not be as incisive or verbose as the pros. Feel free to dismiss these opinions, I mostly watch films!

***

1. NewJeans

Let's start with the group that made me fall into this rabbithole in the first place. NewJeans is a girl group that debuted in 2022 but has found massive popularity in the Tiktok age. Their songs incorporate elements of dance music, house and club music, with sweet vocals and a very cute, fresh and pop aesthetic. I find it interesting that a lot of these songs are specifically engineered for social media usage i.e. relevant passages and hooks fit nicely within the 15 or 30 second length for the shortform video format. This is also a younger group than I'm used to, as their youngest member (Hyein) is 15 as of this writing. (To contrast, their oldest member, Minji, is 19.) 

Favorite Song: OMG (released 2023)

OMG is a song that wears its all consuming love-crush on its sleeve, with lyrics about how having a crush on someone can sometimes make us crazy. I may be an old guy, but that's something that's pretty relateable. The music video literalizes that, showing NewJeans' five members in a mental hospital, living out various illusory lives. Metatextually, only Danielle knows they're actually filming a music video, and the ending seems to imply that the lives that these girls live in their minds have a ring of truth to them. It's a fun song, it's catchy as hell and like many of their discography, it's a bop.

2. Le Sserafim

This group may have debuted only a month before NewJeans, but this is probably the group I'm most familiar with: three of the members of this five (formerly six) member group were from the reality show Produce48, and two of those girls came from the disbanded supergroup formed after that show's conclusion, IZ*ONE. In particular, ex IZ*ONE member Sakura Miyawaki was also previously a huge idol in Japan as part of the group HKT48. Like many of her fellow members, she got out of her comfort zone and joined this group. Their concept is 'being fearless,' and after watching their pre-debut documentary The World is My Oyster I've come to think of another way of interpreting the concept: it's not that these ladies have zero fear, but they go forward in spite of it. Take this with a grain of salt as I am not a dancer, but they've continually impressed me with tight, difficult choreography and formation dancing, and catchy beats with memorable hooks. They're also extremely entertaining during promotional activities. My YouTube homepage is filled with their videos because of that. 

Favorite Song: Fearless (released 2022, re-released 2023)

Artists sometimes make songs to make a statement to the world at large; Fearless is one such song and the statement is 'we've arrived, and we're here to stay.' The song itself is the one that embodies their 'fearless' concept the most, to keep on keeping on despite what the world may think. The official music video (which still features all 6 original members)  has each member in various situations (riding a bike, climbing a ladder, standing in front of a wall with graffiti) which serves more as a means for visually hyping its debuting members.

3. XG

XG ('Xtraordinary Girls') is a bit of an anomaly: they are an all-Japanese girl group who sings primarily in English and promotes in Korea. Are they K-pop? Maybe? I dunno. With heavy R&B and hip hop influences, even though they're the girl group I know the least about, XG is probably my most favorite of the girl groups I've seen in this period. They're all extremely talented singers and dancers and I find all of their very small discography (they have like, 10 songs) impressive.

Favorite Song: Shooting Star

I'll be honest, there are so many choices to put on here (Left Right, esp. the remix, Tippy Toes, New Dance, TGIF) but I'll have to shout out Shooting Star for the chorus (I think it's the chorus lol) where members Chisa and Juria sing in harmony and it's like D50 Glucose being injected into my veins.  I love it.

***

That's the end of my post. I'll be watching out for more groups in the future (let's look at boy groups next time) and maybe this thing can get multiple parts. Maybe like do a franchise or something, I want to do something other than review films in my pseudo-retirement. I may also consider going to a K-pop concert in the future, who knows. So anyway, watch out for that comeback when it happens.

Puregold Cinepanalo Film Festival: Reviews of all Full Length Films

 

I suppose I shouldn't be surprised that a chain of grocery stores started a film festival - we did have ToFarm, after all. Puregold's Cinepanalo Film Festival is a festival that, in their words, aims "to deliver powerful narratives celebrating Filipino strength, success, and joy in movies that aim to foster Filipino talent through filmmakers, actors, and actresses." The full length feature offerings of the festival are comprised of works by established directors, up and coming talents and newcomers to the industry. For the most part, the results are pretty fine - I didn't find myself disliking any of the entries.

Granted, there's a caveat to all this, given production constraints for both budget and time, these films aren't all going to look stellar. Filmmakers have done a lot with less (some iterations of Cinemalaya come to mind) but it's a big ask. The lack of polish hurts some of these films: sound levels out of wack, dialogue recorded with an audible buzz, visuals that look muddy or out of focus, but for what these six films have done in such a short time, it's still pretty impressive. Here are some thoughts on the six full length entries of the festival:

*

After mishearing a lab competition as a "love" competition, Pinky (Uzziel Delamide) inadvertently joins an inter-school agriculture quiz bee. It isn't all bad, mainly because of two reasons: 1) her crush, Genesis (Potchi Angeles) is her teammate and 2) being an Aeta who is familiar with local foliage, she's actually pretty good at this sort of thing.

What follows is a wholesome tale that's never cloying, a pure and unbothered kind of love from two people who have their own hopes and dreams. Pinky feels an omnipresent insecurity borne from years of colonial thinking and discrimination, and in a crucial part of the film, this leads her to set aside her dreams for someone else's. But aside from being a movie about young romance, A Lab Story is also a story of self-lab, pardon the pun: one where our protagonists learn that their own dreams are just as important as everyone else's.

While the film has its share of non-actors, Uzziel Delamide and Potchi Angeles do a great job as our central couple, though Donna Cariaga's supporting role as their equally lovestruck teacher and coach carries the film as well. A Lab Story may not have much polish, but it's the most charming local film I've seen this year.

*

Mary (Lady Morgana) works in a parlor and takes care of a son (Tommy Alejandrino) from a one night stand with their lesbian friend. One day they find out that their coach and mother figure has died. See, back in the day, Mary was part of a volleyball team in their barangay, and they were damn good at it. Since then, they've all gone their separate ways. In order to pay for their coach's costly funeral expenses, Mary sets off (was that a pun? lol) to reform the team, win a barangay-wide One Day League and recapture the glory of lost days.

Most of One Day League is Mary assembling the team and competing in games as they ascend the league tournament, while showing their lives in the interim. This is not necessarily a sports movie as it is a slice of life: while the volleyball in this film is exciting and pretty well shot, the film has always been more about the family that Mary and their teammates have formed over the years, and the close bonds they still have despite the time and distance in between.

In communities where you are pushed to the side or discriminated against, marginalized groups find solace and comfort in each other and the strength that stems from that is, in the film's view, unbeatable. That's a message I can get behind. Things don't always end cleanly, life goes on, and that's okay. Granted, it's rough around the edges, but One Day League had its share of fun moments.

*

The people of Negros love food. They love cooking it, they love baking it, and of course, they love eating it. Love is the operative word here, and it is also the central concept behind this next film. Food is so beloved, in fact, that of all the food-centric local films that I've seen (I can probably count them with two hands), two of them are from Negros: the 2008 film Namets! and this film - Kurt Soberano's Under a Piaya Moon.

Stephen (Jeff Moses) is an idealistic baker who seeks to reopen his family's baking shop. He and his girlfriend Joy (Pauline Dimaranan) aim to innovate on their product and make new products inspired by pastries from other countries. But Joy cheats on poor Stephen, leaving him distraught and in search of direction. He comes across his grandmother, Fina (Charito Ferrer-Motus), who has left her home because she fought with her husband Poldo (Joel Torre.) Through his grandparents, Stephen begins to rediscover the love he has for his craft and the true essence of Negros cuisine.

All of what I just said in that previous paragraph is told in a strangely edited, haphazard manner, as if Stephen himself was telling you the story on a drunken night. For my own sensibilities (that are not rooted in Negros) don't think it works particularly well but I think it's emblematic of director Kurt Soberano's approach to the film: this is a film about love, and that love manifests itself in his work, just as much as Poldo and Fina's food, adhering to decades (or even centuries) old baking and cooking traditions, is unequivocally Negrense. When Stephen deviates too much from the recipe his grandparents have taught him, his food no longer has the essence of the pastries he is tasked to make - just as this film would not be a Negrense film had it been told any other way.

This is a film that values tradition in both its form and its content - love extending to pride, a love of one's own traditions and beliefs. It's also why it juxtaposes this traditionalism vs modernism duality to Stephen's love for Joy versus his grandparent's love. Whereas the former is concerned with money and opportunity and goes from one lover to another, the latter endures despite hardships, always, inevitably, returning home.

It sometimes loses its momentum at some points - for example, Soberano is no stranger to compelling and exciting camerawork like in certain oners in his short film Golden Bells, which would have been an asset in the competition parts of the film - but the finished product is still fine. At some points it goes into the process of making these pastries and those are honestly my favorite parts of the film. At the very least, Under a Piaya Moon made my mouth water, and for me that's more than enough.

*

Road to Happy is as straightforward as it sounds: an influencer, Herald (VJ Mendoza) is headed to the province for a gig. Along the way, a stowaway (Darlyn Izabelle Salang) boards his van; taking pity on the girl, he decides to bring her to her home because it's only a small detour... a small detour that spirals out of control.

Road to Happy is a about a man looking for (and finding) the happiness that he's looking for, though that happiness isn't in what he's doing right now - in work where social relationships are manufactured and impersonal. Herald finds love and warmth from the people he meets in his journey and experiences contentment for the first time in a long time, and it's because they're seeing him for who he truly is, and not the social media persona he projects into the world, or as a replaceable commodity to be exploited.

Unfortunately, the road to that happiness isn't very exciting - though the film has its share of comedic parts, it lacks the comedic punchiness of Joel Ferrer's best films. It's carried somewhat by Smokey Manaloto's performance, but it's not enough. It's still a relatively fine film to watch, but I'd understand if some disembark from the journey midway.

*

I was a boy at the back too when I was a kid, not because I was academically delinquent or anything, but because I was the tallest. Still, because many of us attended the same school from my elementary and even my preschool days, I was friendly or at least acquaintances with everyone, even the ones that weren't academically stellar. These people, my second family in a way, were normal boys and girls just like me, trying to get by school as well as they could. Decades later, some of these kids who weren't achievers or who didn't particularly stand out ended up doing pretty well for themselves. Many have families and a thriving business. Heck, some of them make more money than I do.

Raynier Brizuela's Boys at the Back is about one such group of misfits, high school students who have been left behind by an educational system that either pretends they don't exist or dismisses them entirely. While they languish in educational limbo, their teacher (Bani Baldisseri) terrorizes the rest of the class, concerned not with educating these students but instead with propping himself up for the limelight.

It takes a transfer student named Kevin (Noel Comia Jr.) to meet these misfits head on and actually interact with them as people and teach them in their own language. He finds a strange affinity to them, not only because Kevin is himself an outsider, but also because he has his own things going on: his mom and dad separated, and he's still attached to the last thing his dad gave him before he left. As for the titular boys (and girl!) in the back, Brizuela gives us little hints as to what they're about and why they are the way they are academically: they are either occupied by other things, don't have support systems in place (financially or otherwise) so that they can study properly, or conventional ways of teaching just don't work on them. Kevin creates an environment where they can thrive and still be themselves, and that's why they succeed.  In the absence of proper educational authority figures, students find their own solidarity in peer groups and friends.

I've seen reviews of this film that note how Kevin's confiscated iPod disappears from the story past a certain point and how such a disappearance means several things are left unresolved. The iPod represents an attachment to the past, and it was never the point of the film. Or rather: Kevin finds a new family of his own with these people and grows himself because of them.

Boys at the Back is itself a misfit as far as movies go: the film is obviously shot on a shoestring budget, and Brizuela casts himself and his friends as the titular Boys. There's a noticeable level of jank in it all. Despite that, there's something endearing in that scrappiness and the movie as a whole works because of it. Like my classmates who were themselves getting by the best they could, Boys at the Back (in my opinion) got by this viewer pretty well. And if Brizuela can do something like this with this much, imagine what can happen with a proper budget behind him.

*

Pushcart Tales gains points by taking place in an actual Puregold, and goes for a creative interpretation of the festival's uplifting/wholesome theme, because on the surface it looks anything but wholesome, the film beginning with a sequence of its six main characters as zombies, shambling aimlessly in the ruins of a Puregold that's seen better days. But Zombies in this context is an (admittedly unwieldy) metaphor for a second chance, a way to live a life anew for its six protagonists.

In the present day, during what appears to be a world-ending deluge, the employees and customers of a local supermarket are trapped with no way to go home. There's manager Jack and senior employee Sarah (husband-wife team Nonie and Shamaine Buencamino), rookie employee Emily (Therese Malvar), straggler and supermarket regular Ria (Elora Españo), rich kid Ryan (Harvey Bautista) and senile regular Benjamin (Carlos Siguion-Reyna).

The dialogue and structure of the film resembles theater than anything else, though this is probably one of the best casts that could tackle the material - and indeed, this cast is a contender for best local ensemble of the year so far. Much like other films with a small cast in an enclosed space (Vincenzo Natali's 1997 film Cube comes to mind) the film slowly reveals more about its characters, in both well integrated and contrived ways. A major example of the latter occurs halfway through the film, where a simple game becomes an extended series of flashbacks that provide more context to its characters' motivations and backstory. At the end of it all it spans a giant chunk of the film, and while it's well acted, it feels clunky and unnatural. Immediately following that is a moment of lucidity that serves as another series of character revelations that, while also still a bit clunky, feels more natural and didn't need to go into a long segue of flashbacks.

Given the production restrictions of the film, Pushcart Tales is quite impressive, looking very much like the most polished of the bunch. Though the pieces don't quite fit as well as they could, I had a good time watching nevertheless.

Japanese Film Festival 2024: We Made a Beautiful Bouquet (Nobuhiro Doi, 2021)

 

Note: some spoilers.

There's a part in Nobuhiro Doi's We Made a Beautiful Bouquet where Kinu (Kasumi Arimura) finds out that one of her favorite bloggers has died. Said blogger often (perhaps cynically) talked about the end of love, that every love story's beginning is the beginning of the end, that all love stories have an expiry date. This love story is no exception: in fact, the very beginning of the film has its two protagonists dating other people, the entire film being a flashback of the five years leading up to that point. This is not a story of love that endured forever; this is love that has run its course and has arrived at its natural conclusion.

You wouldn't know it from the start, though: this film features one of the most romantic meet cutes in contemporary Japanese cinema. Kinu and her soon-to-be boyfriend Mugi (Masaki Suda) feel like they were born to be with each other, with their two actors bringing their A-game to the proceedings. I half-joke, but the only time where I saw Masaki Suda have more chemistry with his co-star was either with Renn Kiriyama or Nana Komatsu.

But things take a turn for the worse, and perhaps either by design or coincidence, the film gives us a clue to what dooms the relationship. Over time, Kinu and Mugi's relationship changes, and during one disastrous movie date, Kinu has that realization. The movie they are watching is Aki Kaurismaki's The Other Side of Hope (2017). We Made a Beautiful Bouquet feels like a response to Kaurismaki's romantic films that portray working class people striving to make ends meet in a bleak world. It joins films like Never Not Love You (2018) that show the detrimental effects of the ever increasing demands of labor on a young population. "Just endure it for five years and it'll be easy," a sempai tells Mugi as they drive around the prefecture, but what he doesn't tell Mugi is that it's not easy because the work will be simpler, things will be easy because he will have been numbed to the culture. While Kaurismaki optimistically believes in the endurance of love despite living in a capitalist world in films like Fallen Leaves (2023), in this film, at least in part, capitalism is the end of love. It kills something fundamental within us, where trying to make a living prevents us from just living, where marriage becomes a compromise rather than a commitment.

But the film does not end on a bleak note.  Breakups can be planned in advance and treated with positivity, but they are hardly a clean break. Even though the love is gone, the act of having loved will never go away. Still, as long as it wasn't abusive, there's nothing wrong with treating past relationships with gratitude, because (hopefully) you and your partner changed each other for the better, and you will carry that to your next relationship, and to the next. The author Ranata Suzuki once said that "your heart is a mosaic of everyone you've ever loved," and this film takes it to heart.

Present Confusion 2023 Roundup Part 2: Philippine Cinema Favorites

 

2023 was a year of regrowth for Philippine Cinema. 160 films were released in theaters, streaming or limited runs this year, surpassing output even in pre-pandemic times. A large chunk of these films were Vivamax releases of various levels of quality. While various other streaming services had their own productions (Netflix with a couple of romantic films and the Keys to the Heart remake, Amazon Prime with a slate of their own through collaborations with ANIMA studios and the Ideafirst Company,) Vivamax's streaming output was seconded only by the now defunct AQ Prime, who stopped releasing films near the middle of the year. Another streaming startup, Goblin films, started and stopped with only Jay Altarejos' The Last Resort as its sole would-be offering.

In the relative absence of new feature film-centric film festivals, feature lengths from the surviving post pandemic festivals (Cinemalaya, MMFF) had to step up. QCinema, despite being still the best film fest in the country, has not yet returned to holding a competition local feature films. The newly established Manila Film Festival (not to be confused with the MMFF) debuted with a slew of poorly made student productions which barely got any buzz from audiences outside of the filmmakers themselves.

Cinemalaya was by far the festival that stepped up the most. Buoyed by funding from the FDCP and a film lab to further refine the potential films, Cinemalaya fielded one of its best (if not the best) lineups in its 19 year history. The only downside would be the festival's move to the PICC as the CCP underwent renovation - a good decision for a festival for people to meet up and talk, but not so much a film festival, as PICC venues are not designed for film screenings. If it still takes place at the PICC, next year's Cinemalaya should be sponsored by Salonpas.

One of the year's biggest surprises was the MMFF, which, in the absence of films by either Vice Ganda and Vic Sotto, still managed to gross 1 billion pesos at the box office. Lines to the cinema are still long to this day, after the festival's run was supposed to end. While it looks like box office is still skewed towards a couple of high performers, the outcome of the festival may be a good sign that Filipinos aren't necessarily beholden to a few people - give them good stories that they can watch with their families and they'll come.

Admittedly, I don't have the stamina I once had, but I endeavored to watch every single Filipino film released in Filipino theaters in some capacity in 2023, and thanks to friends over at the Society of Filipino Film Reviewers (SFFR), I have actually managed to do so - with the exception of Crisanto Aquino's Instant Daddy, I have watched every 2023 Filipino film released in theaters. The operative phrase there is "released in theaters," as unfortunately, I have not had the time to watch all of the films released through streaming - a couple of colleagues have, however, watched way more Vivamax films than I have, and I recommend going to letterboxd to check out their reviews. By the time this three part writeup is finished, I will have watched approximately 120 out of those 160 Filipino films, which is a clean 75%.

Honorable mentions (in no particular order) include: About Us But Not About Us (dir. Jun Lana), the last two segments of Shake Rattle and Roll Extreme (various directors), Mallari (dir. Derick Cabrido), Essential Truths of the Lake (dir. Lav Diaz) and National Anarchist Lino Brocka (dir. Khavn).

Anyway, on to this list: any film, whether released on streaming or in a theater counts, and this is a list that belongs only to me, as you might have a very different list because everyone is different. Short films are not included here; they will be featured in a separate list in the third part of this writeup. Without further ado, here is

John Tawasil's

TEN FAVORITE FILIPINO FILMS OF 2023

10. Love You Long Time (dir. JP Habac) - Habac's timey-wimey romance of two lovers whose worlds don't exactly align stayed with me the longest, after its surprise ending recontextualized its entire conceit. Also, Habac manipulates the frame - further experimentation from his earlier Dito at Doon - to emphasize its characters' distance.

9. Kampon (dir. King Palisoc) - perhaps the weirdest Filipino horror movie of 2023, and I mean that in a good way. Kampon externalizes the various anxieties of parenthood into a malevolent, demonic force. 

8. Gomburza (dir. Pepe Diokno) - a history film that stands in contrast to Jerrold Tarog's duology (Heneral Luna, Goyo) where its focus on historical fact is a reflection of its stance on truth and truth telling; an interrogation of martyrdom and how simply believing in what is right or becoming a symbol for change reverberates throughout generations.

7. Nowhere Near (dir. Miko Revereza) - what starts with Revereza's continued exploration as a stateless individual, navigating neoliberal immigration policies in America (the rollercoaster scene still lives in my brain rent free) evolves into something entirely different once Revereza comes home, or rather, comes near a perceived ideal of "home" but never really reaches it. "Home" is a bunch of cracked, dilapidated steps - the last vestiges of history, eroded by colonial tides.

6. Ang Duyan ng Magiting (dir. Dustin Celestino) - discoursive, provocative - Celestino's latest navigates through all the complicated nuances of nationalism, and how it can be closely intertwined with violence of all sorts.

5. Huling Palabas (dir. Ryan Machado) - metamorphosis, coming of age, a record of transition from one era to the next, Huling Palabas shows time, place and person all in a state of flux, with at least the latter settling into a sense of knowing, in some capacity, one's place in the world.

4. Iti Mapukpukaw (dir. Carl Joseph Papa) - our entry to the Academy Awards' best foreign film is one of the best choices in this year's lineup of films: an examination of trauma that isn't afraid of going to dark places; a tender and loving testament to how understanding (or at least, the attempt to understand) ultimately leads to healing. One of the best endings of any Filipino film this year.

3. Third World Romance (dir. Dwein Baltazar) - sadly overlooked by mainstream audiences, Third World Romance finds common ground with another exceptional film from world cinema: Aki Kaurismaki's Fallen Leaves - where two people, chained to the unfair demands of a capitalist society, try to find happiness in each other.

2. As if It's True (dir. John Rogers) - to me, As if It's True is an essential film that captures the nebulous state of truth in online spaces, the creation of virtual images and online personas, and the creation of subjective realities in the backdrop of a post-truth society. Its manipulation of form to further blur that distinction between what is true and what is not is unmatched by any other film that I've seen this year.

1. Gitling (dir. Jopy Arnaldo) - anyone who knows me will probably figure out my choice for favorite 2023 film of the year. In my opinion, it's not even close. Wrapped in a familiar, romantic package, Gitling is an exploration of language, in how language shared helps us form bonds and share experiences, how the structure of language itself shares its DNA with how we deal with metatextuality in film, in the process of how we intuit the construction of sentences is not all that different in how we intuit the endings of films made many times before. Its final frames are haunting, layered with meaning, so much so that instead of watching a few more of those 160 films, I opted to watch Gitling one more time - and it's time well spent.

***

Usually the remaining segment of this roundup is spent on documenting the weirdest and worst moments in Philippine Cinema, but this time let's do something different. For the final part of this 2023 roundup, I want to tell a few stories about movies that I saw this year (both good and bad), and, a few words about the future of this blog. Stay tuned.

Present Confusion 2023 Roundup Part 1: World Cinema Favorites

 

Another year of great movies done. Hi. regular readers of this blog. It's time for me to tell you about all the films I liked in 2023.

Let's mix it up a little. In previous iterations of this roundup, we've put the world cinema selections for last. This time, let's make it first. Why? I just want to. And give that I have an announcement at the end of part 3, there's a bit of a reason for this specific order.

I think in terms of movie watching, 2023 is the first year where we truly found ourselves free of the coronavirus pandemic. And by "free", I mean the virus is totally still everywhere (transmitted even more in its entire history by some accounts) but most of us pretend it isn't there because we're all tired of this shit. People returning to the cinemas categorically includes annoying people, and predictably, twoish years of isolation in our homes messed us up in ways we are still beginning to discover. I have also been guilty of this at times, I am no saint, sometimes I even annoy myself.

Something also shifted the moviegoing public's preferences this year. For some reason, Hollywood tentpole franchise films are no longer the guaranteed financial successes that they were before the pandemic. Disney was hit hard by this shift, with many of their releases (including several movies from their vaunted MCU) barely making a fraction of their budget, and a pittance compared to their past box office glories. Audiences found themselves drawn to biopics such as Oppenheimer and relatively well constructed commercial products like Barbie.

Streaming in festival spaces died down as more festivals returned to face to face screenings, with hybrid setups rare or even gone in some instances. Various film industries geared up their production, but only time will tell how the landscape will change from here on in.

This list includes all my favorite 2023 films that I saw in the past year; any 2022 film is counted; and ranking is relatively loose and based more on vibes than anything else. I used to say "favorites, not best" but heck, my favorite films are the best to me. This list does not include Filipino films, that's in a separate list. Also because I'm a weeb (or something), a lot of these films are from Japan. Go figure.

here is a list of

John Tawasil's

25 WORLD CINEMA FAVORITES 2023 EDITION

25. Shayda (dir. Noora Niasari) - many of the films on this list are hewn from personal experiences. Based on the director's personal experiences in a women's shelter, Shayda is a prayer for breath in a suffocating world where freedom feels like a distant dream.

24. Animalia (dir. Sofia Alaoui) - Animalia is also about seeking freedom - this ambitious, imaginative mix of science fiction, horror and Islamic eschatology depicts metaphorical birds in metaphorical cages, where the end of the world ironically gives them what they need, though not necessarily what they want..

23. Past Lives (dir. Celine Song) - this was dangerously close to not being included in this list, but I do so after a rewatch where I fixated on John Magaro's character, where I read the film not necessarily as a story about fated love, but a film about endless regret; a film not necessarily about immigrants, but a film about trying to understand them; not necessarily a film about those who leave and those left behind, but instead about the people who choose to stay and the people who keep those people where they are. 

22. The First Slam Dunk (dir. Takehiko Inoue) - Slam Dunk fans have been waiting years - even decades - for a final conclusion to the story, and this is a near-perfect way of doing so, Inoue proving he has a grasp of film as skilled as his grasp on manga. And even for non-fans, The First Slam Dunk is a wonderful, exhilarating film that will keep you on the edge of your seat up until that final buzzer.

21. Concrete Utopia (dir. Um Tae-hwa) - in the space of two hours and ten minutes, through propulsive, compelling filmmaking, Um Tae-hwa creates a microcosm of the human condition, and shows humanity in all its flawed glory: equal parts civilized and barbaric, equal parts enlightened being and savage animal all in one.

20. Lonely Glory (dir. Keitaro Sakon) - I enjoy a good villain story - or rather, a story about a protagonist so ruthless in their design, so doggedly stubborn in their desire to achieve their goal, that only in retrospect do they see the wreckage (both human or otherwise) in their wake. With a career-highlight performance by Kokoro Morita, Lonely Glory surprised me in ways I didn't expect.

19. Poor Things (dir. Yorgos Lanthimos) - Yorgos at perhaps his funniest and most twisted, Barbie without the corporate paradox and flawed iconography, a claiming of self drenched in sex and violence, messy and flawed and even problematic, but ultimately a blast to experience and autopsy its various little parts.

18. Ryuichi Sakamoto Opus (dir. Neo Sora) - one of my most personal picks in this list. Opus is my favorite concert film of the year, a solemn yet powerful goodbye to a peerless artist who gave and gave to his art until, in the end, there was nothing at all. 

17. Seventeeners (dir. Prithvi Konanur) - a harrowing portrait of two people who otherwise mean well and want to do the right thing, but whose hands are tied because of a society more concerned with appearances rather than what is right.

16. Killers of the Flower Moon (dir. Martin Scorsese) - not the best Scorsese, but still a cutting exploration of race, guilt, of perspective, heck, of storytelling itself. Dismantles its source novel's mystery setup and transforms it into an indictment of shameless white American greed.

15. The Taste of Things (dir. Tran Anh Hung) - I never expected to cry to food (in a non hangry context, mind you) this year, but I did, and for good reason. It made me happy, it made me sad, it made me hungry, and it's such a lovely depiction of the many ways we express our love.

14. Blue Giant (dir. Yuzuru Tachikawa) - I've been disappointed by many "jazz" films that only use the medium as a platform in the service of another story, but I've never seen a film that embodies Jazz itself: a chaotic yet somehow synergistic mishmash of creative energy and technical skill. In its musical sections and through a mix of 2d and 3d animation, Blue Giant captures in cinema form the essence of what Jazz is and what it means to fans of that musical genre. Remarkably, it gives up on the fight of proper adaptation - aware of the medium's shortcomings to cover everything, it depicts its source manga in an appropriately jazz-like fashion by riffing on the text. It shouldn't work, but it does, and the result is amazing.

13. Abang Adik (dir. Lay Jin Ong) - an astonishing, gripping film about what it means to be an unseen son of Malaysia whose loudest, most powerful scene is drenched in silence.

12. Shin Kamen Rider (dir. Hideaki Anno) - introspective Hideaki Anno is best Hideaki Anno. Anno frames this legendary tokusatsu hero's story as a meditation on loneliness, our desire to form relationships with an 'other', and how people are both heaven and hell in turn.

11. Io Capitano (dir. Matteo Garrone) - I expected this film to be bleak, and in a way, it is: in this oddysey, many people are left by the wayside. But what blew me away in this film by Matteo Garrone are the small glimpses of humanity, kindness and hope despite it all.

10. Jigarthanda Double X (dir. Karthik Subbaraj) - I admit, even for a slight romantic such as myself, Karthik Subbaraj's manifesto for the power of cinema to change society is a tad too idealistic, but it's presented with such enthusiasm and love for Tamil Cinema (and cinema in general) that I couldn't help but get swept away in it all.

9. River (dir. Junta Yamaguchi) - Junta Yamaguchi has shown with his two feature films how much he enjoys playing around with the medium, telling fantastically structured stories that transcend their gimmick and are legitimately a fun time at the cinema. It's way more fun than many movies with ten times the budget, which is proof that a good movie just needs a good idea executed wonderfully.

8. Do Not Expect Too Much From The End of The World (dir. Radu Jude) - this uncompromising, biting satire of the state of Romania (in both senses of the word) and how its lessons stay unlearned in the course of generations made this one of the most surprising films I've seen this year.

7. A Man (dir. Kei Ishikawa) - one of my early favorite films of 2023, Kei Ishikawa's A Man interrogates the notion of identity through Japan's 'disappeared people,' or Jouhatsu. At times strange and obtuse yet very compelling, it is in a way a spiritual brother to Shohei Imamura's A Man Vanishes (1967).

6. Abnormal Desire (dir. Yoshiyuki Kishi) - Another film that unexpectedly blew me out of the water (was that a pun? lol) This film deals with a sensitive subject in such a tender, human way that I found it quite remarkable, showing its human characters in all their dimensions, good or bad. Also, such an unexpected turn from Yui Aragaki.

5. Perfect Days (dir. Wim Wenders) - no film has wanted me to clean toilets in Japan like this one (I may have visited one of those fantastic toilets a few days ago and left a game of tic tac toe). Wender's latest is a solemn look into the life of an ordinary man who chooses to stop as the world moves around him; a rock quietly sitting in a raging stream.

4. Godzilla Minus One (dir. Takashi Yamazaki) - my favorite franchise film of the year that is frankly light years beyond anything Hollywood has produced in 2023, if only because it recognizes spectacle unto itself does not make a good movie, that metatextuality has ruined the notion of American blockbuster filmmaking, that good characters always elevate a decent movie into an excellent one, and that people aren't exactly tired of franchise films - they're tired of bad ones. RRR showed Hollywood that lesson last year, hopefully they'll get the message this time.

3. Not Friends (dir. Atta Hemwadee) - In the past few years Thailand always had a place in this list, usually for a film that reaches beyond its mainstream bounds and achieves something quite lovely. What starts off as a fun love letter to filmmaking shifts in its second act into an examination of friendship itself, and how we move and inspire each other in small yet profound, invisible yet deeply felt ways. I can only speak for myself, but I found it all deeply moving.

2. Evil Does Not Exist (dir. Ryusuke Hamaguchi) - Hamaguchi's examination of human nature, on the nature and perception of 'evil', and the violence imposed by capitalist interest on indigenous and rural spaces is riveting cinema that lives in my mind rent free ever since I watched it a few months ago.

1. Monster (dir. Hirokazu Kore-eda) - what is a monster? A parent who acts out only in loving service to their child? An education system that devours well-meaning educators and strips them of the ability to express their empathy? Misunderstood people who only want the opportunity to love? Or a society that shuns anyone who strays from the norm? In gentle yet devastating strokes, Kore-eda paints a picture where everyone is seen as a monster in their own ways, but are only human beings trying to live out their lives the way they want.

***

Next up is a list of 10 of my favorite Filipino Films so stay tuned for that.

MMFF 2023 | Becky and Badette

 

Becky (Eugene Domingo) and Badette (Pokwang) live relatively humdrum lives as janitresses for a corporation. On the side, they try to pursue their dreams: Becky makes music and Badette goes to various auditions. But success is elusive for the duo, and they are mostly left either unrecognized or looked down upon by their peers.

That changes, however, when during a class reunion, Becky makes a drunken statement saying that she and Badette are in a relationsihp. Their story inspires many and the two gain the stardom they've always wished for - but success based on a lie eternally teeters on a precipice, and some people begin to plot their downfall.

First and foremost, Jun Lana's Becky and Badette is a comedy, and in my opinion, a good one - ever since I saw Pokwang and Eugene Domingo together earlier this year in Lana's Ten Little Mistresses, I wanted a film with these two. It works, though perhaps the comedy would be better served if Lana let go of his restraint a lot more (Wenn Deramas' absence is deeply felt here.) Nevertheless, there are references to many films both old and new, especially Danny Zialcita's T-Bird at Ako, from which this story draws inspiration.

There is a little quirk as the film reaches its climax, where Becky realizes something about herself, though sadly the thought isn't explored as much as I would have wanted.

But the film also asks a question of us: who should tell the stories of queer people? The obvious answer is that queer or LGBTQ+ people should be able to tell their own stories. In faking their relationship, not only are they profiting from this lie, but they contribute indirectly to the erasure of queer stories. Aside from that, Lana emphasizes the importance of accountability for such actions - otherwise, without it, people may be emboldened to do it again.

The ownership of stories is important. When one owns a story and when the work of art that emerges accurately portrays one's lived experiences, that is representation, and nothing is more important. My thoughts stray back towards T-Bird at Ako. It's writer, Portia Ilagan, is a member of the LGBTQ community. Even in the eighties, despite the limitations of a conservative and creatively limiting society, we gave spaces for queer and LGBTQ creatives to tell their stories. In a candy coated, 'mainstream' comedic wrapper, Becky and Badette reminds us that that idea will always be important.

MMFF 2023 | Penduko, Kampon, When I Met You In Tokyo, Mallari

 

Created by national artist Francisco Conching, the character of Pedro Penduko draws from a rich tapestry of Filipino folklore. Using his skills, insight and magical tools, Pedro Penduko uses his abilities to fight evil and protect the land. Perhaps Filipinos will be familiar with earlier versions of the character, such as a two movie series where Janno Gibbs played the titular hero, or the long running TV series starring Matt Evans. Either way, this film seems like an interesting way to reintroduce the character to a whole new generation of fans. But what ultimately happens to many superhero films - a long production process and script changes - seems to have happened here in some capacity, leading to a pastiche of superhero and franchise tropes that work in some parts, while faltering in others.

Penduko (Matteo Guidicelli) lives an otherwise unremarkable life in the city, using his powers to get high and scam perya employees (not necessarily in that order). Helping fellow bettors is 'collateral damage', as he usually does this for his own gain. One day, he is recruited into a secret organization of local sorcerers whose task is to ostensibly fight evil and protect the good guys.

This part of the film looks like it draws from many different sources: Harry Potter, My Hero Academia, similar school-themed anime and other media. Penduko is a bright student and he learns to excel in healing and warding off curses, which is done as fights in a separate virtual/mental space. At least in this regard, the worldbuilding works well to create an interesting milieu for our friends to play in.

But then one notices that the uniforms are military coded, and sorcerers are referred to as agents. The subtext isn't very subtle here. Penduko then finds itself under the umbrella of a different organization, one that operates 'outside' the fantasy world's 'law,' but one that, in essence, isn't as different as the organization he originally came from. The movie comments on the notion of systems and groups (meant for the common good of all) that are ultimately co-opted in the service of a few. The film also asks the moral question of how exactly do we go about extinguishing a clear and present evil: that is, if we become tainted by that evil in the process, is it worth it? Does the end truly justify the means?

That's all and good, but unfortunately, like director Jason Paul Laxamana's other forays into genre (Pwera Usog, Instalado) they serve as setup for an idea that's not completely fleshed out by the end. What happens to the organizations Penduko leaves? What about his friends? What are the repercussions of the events of the film in this world that I honestly want to explore more? This film feels like the first part of a series and is barely a self contained story. If Viva has plans to expand the series that would be fine, but if the series stops here, then that would be very unfortunate. This isn't necessarily Penduko's problem, but a problem of franchise filmmaking in general.

Matteo Guidicelli does his best in the role, but I feel he is miscast (if anything, he'd be a good fit for the character of Saki, I think). His being a half foreign actor playing a half foreign character seems to be a holdover from a past version of the script, when James Reid was still attached to the role and the character was depicted having a mixed heritage. I don't think Reid would've been an improvement over Guidicelli, though given that the premise of the film (and Penduko's heritage?) is now different, maybe someone else would be suited for the role. Heck, Alamat did a great ending song for this film, get one of them to play the part.

Penduko feels like a film from MMFF's past. It has a ton of very interesting ideas, but the ideas don't always work out.

When I was a child I always imagined having at least three children - maybe a boy and two girls. Decades later, I no longer want children - in this economy? With my pittance of an income? But relatives and friends often ask me and my wife when we're going to have children. We mostly avoid the question now as we don't want to waste time on arguments.

For Clark (Derek Ramsay) and Eileen (Beauty Gonzalez), it's the opposite - they want to have a family but they can't. Clark's impotence weighs down on him, and after many attempts at IVF, he's all but given up and the couple is considering adoption. The first half of the film builds on this tension, wrapped in mundane domesticity, as the two of them grapple with that and various other family matters.

That all changes when Jade (Erin Espiritu) comes to the home. Jade's appearance upends the family dynamic, and while Eileen dotes on the child, Clark is disturbed as he discovers that he has a connection with the child.

Kampon bears many of the hallmarks of its writer Dodo Dayao (Midnight in a Perfect World, Violator). The film finds its terror in strangeness, in weird, unsettling things lurking in the background, in things from which we derive safety ("footage horror" - that is, scary images on recorded media, on CCTV screens and elsewhere - has a steady presence in the film). The film also alludes to the terrors of parenthood, showing us the fears and anxieties of raising a child. There's one scene at a birthday party where a belligerent, spoiled child makes unreasonable demands - a scene that honestly scares me as much as any decapitated corpse (owing to my job occasionally autopsying people, I honestly prefer the corpse).

It's quite unlike anything we've ever seen in the MMFF, and it makes for a legitimately entertaining experience. There are some parts where the film's ambition outpaces its resources. For example, an animated picture of a fetus might have been better rendered in live action, and while the CGI works most of the time, sometimes it doesn't. But that's not necessarily a bad thing; if anything we need more ambition in this festival, and Kampon is brimming with it.

In a strictly formalist sense, there isn't much to say about When I Met You in Tokyo. There isn't much conflict in this movie for its two characters, played by the venerable on screen couple of Christopher De Leon and Vilma Santos. Their issues (mostly with their family members back home) are neatly resolved by the first hour mark. In addition, the film doesn't touch too much upon their lives as overseas workers - the Japanese people who work with and employ them accept them wholeheartedly (one even repeatedly gives Christopher De Leon gifts for some reason or another.)

But the film serves its intended purpose. I watched this film at the Premier Cinemas at the Shangri-la Mall. For those not in the know, cinema prices at the Premier Cinemas are pricier than this upscale mall's normal cinemas. Nevertheless, the theater was mostly full, and mostly consisted of middle aged and elderly women - including myself, I counted three men, and the other two came with what I assume are their wives. I'd even bet that I was the youngest person in the theater aside from the ushers. These are people who have probably spent most of their lives with these two actors, from Tag-ulan sa Tag-Araw (1975) to Dekada '70 (2002). 

At one point in the movie, when Azon (Santos) and Joey (De Leon) were frolicking in the snow, the woman in front of me exclaimed, "ang ganda!" She was probably referring to the snow, but probably also to the couple, who at this point had spent 90 minutes being cute together. The crowd laughed every time the two of them called each other "bru" (short for bruha/brujo), an insult that eventually became a term of endearment. They laughed at the jokes and the light ribbing, they felt kilig at the various jabs, and the thing is, it's hard not to get swept in that emotion - by the time the film ended, I was 100% with that crowd, vicariously living this screen couple's romance. Even if, as a person who reviews films, I find the film flawed or lacking, it nevertheless fills up all the places that it should.

The first half of Derick Cabrido's Mallari is a whirlwind of various scenes that at times feels too convoluted: there's the serial killer priest (Piolo Pascual) who killed 57 people in the 1800s, there's his descendant John Rey (also Piolo Pascual) who is obsessed with finding out the truth behind his infamous ancestor, and there's Jonathan (also Piolo Pascual), who is haunted by future visions where his fiancee Agnes (Janella Salvador) lies dying. The three are connected by a dark secret, but what is it? Why are people still dying in this small town in Laguna even though the killer priest has long passed on?

This first half is the weakest part of the film as it tries to set everything up. As it plods along its three central plotlines, it occasionally veers into filler that only serves to pad the runtime and does little to advance the plot. It is also plagued by frequent and honestly unnecessary jump scares as Jonathan and John Rey are haunted by various apparitions - the ghosts of their ancestor's victims.

But once everything falls into place, something wonderful emerges. Mallari is one of my favorite films in this year's festival, if only for its sprawling ambition and how it manages to meet that ambition in many parts. A mix of alternate history fiction, fantasy and horror, Mallari brings us a singular MMFF experience that has probably never been seen in any previous edition of the festival, and will be unmatched for years to come.

Aside from the various liberties to historical events, I appreciated the fact that the three main characters are not one-sidedly good or evil - in fact, even the characters that are overtly antagonistic do what they do not out of malice, but out of justice: they want to cleanse the world of evil, and this is the means that they will take to achieve that goal. Interestingly, in terms of theme, Mallari sets out to make the same point as Penduko, (the ends justifying the means, getting tainted by evil by extinguishing evil) but this time the film succeeds in doing so. Righteousness is not always good - it only means a dogged belief that one is right, regardless of whether that belief is warranted or not, or whether or not that belief springs from a good place.