Cinemalaya is on again, and I'm back again with more nonsense to spew. I'm going to add a few new features to each review to spice things up.
New Breed Films
Ang Katiwala (The Caretaker)
What the Cynic in Me Expected: 2 Hours of Dennis Trillo sweeping floors and washing windows.
What Actually Happened: A well thought out piece about our society and our place in it.
Ruben (Dennis Trillo) is a handyman who gets fired from his job at the local municipal hall mainly due to political reasons. Without much to sustain his wife and son, and with only a small patch of farmland to get by, he decides to take up his uncle's offer to serve as a caretaker of a large house. The house in this case belonged to Manuel L. Quezon, one of the founders of the Philippine Commonwealth, the transitional government that led us to finally taste independence.
As he goes about his job sweeping floors and washing windows, he learns more about this man and what he went through in life (complete with some interesting animated sequences) and starts to identify with him.
Much of the film revolves around this quote by Manuel Quezon himself (and I paraphrase, because I forgot the original wording) : it is better to have a hellish Philippines governed by its own people than to have a paradise-like Philippines governed by the Americans, because, at least with our own power, we can change.
The film, however, sees the situation as a little more complicated. The film takes place around 2008, where our political system and officials are far from the idealistic vision Quezon had noted in his speeches. Ruben's family, including his extended family in Manila, are harassed by communist 'rebels,' government, and other people around them. Change is something that is hard to come by, because the existing systems are so entrenched in our consciousnesses that we cannot imagine any other system. It's this cynical view that I share, to be quite honest. It takes real guts to enact real and lasting change.
Ruben's position as a caretaker mirrors the US' position as our caretaker during the Commonwealth period, as foreshadowed at around the middle part of the movie. And extending the analogy, we simply either do not learn or ignore the lessons passed on to us by the Americans. And extending this analogy to its limit, as the US left when we could stand by our two feet, Ruben's stint in the house ends with an upheaval as shocking as it is unexpected.
Technically the film is well done, and with a very limited cast of characters the acting is superb. There were some humorous moments in between long scenes of Dennis Trillo doing, well, caretaker stuff. Don't get me wrong, the movie never gets boring.
This ended up being one of the better films of the day for me. Go ahead and take a look.
Metaphor style rating: Kinda like rice that gets more delicious as you eat and has meat at the bottom.
Ang Nawawala (What isn't There)
What the Cynic in Me Expected: A movie about a bunch of hipsters falling in love, being not mainstream, listening to indie music and talking about Kerouac. Or something.
What Actually Happened: Basically the above, but really, really well done.
Gibson Bonifacio (Dominic Roco) is a photographer, although I'm not really sure he has a job as one. Anyway, he just up and decided not to talk, ever. There's a reason for this, but I won't spoil it for you guys. Anyway, he returns to the Philippines after studying abroad (how he managed to finish without uttering a single word, well that's a story for another day.)
He meets up with an old friend, stuff happens, and soon he gets to fall in love for the first time. All this in between listening to indie music, looking at paintings, and lounging around in spas. In the meantime, certain aspects of his past and his family's issues begin to unravel.
Seeing the trailer and everything else, I thought I would totally hate this film. Why? Because EWWWWW HIPSTERS. But surpringly, it delivers in just the right ways. This film is actually my favorite film of the festival so far.
The best part of the film is the music. Throughout the film you hear songs from various names in the indie music scene. I have no idea who most of them are (but hooray for Hannah + Gabi) but they fit into every scene very well. An apt comparison would be to last year's Ang Sayaw ng Dalawang Kaliwang Paa. Because the music is excellent, every scene has this palpable emotion that you rarely see in any Filipino film, anywhere. This is one film where I'd gladly purchase the soundtrack.
Visually the film delivers as well. You often see shots of slums and stuff in independent films, but here the cityscapes and roads show another side of Manila, and it is damn impressive. A later sequence during New Year's Day offers some great visuals too.
The characters are likeable and are not one dimensional, partly thanks to good performances all around. While it would have been nice to flesh out everybody, you have to prune some story here and there to make the story flow better, so it's not really a problem.
It's a great film, and one of the most unique that I have seen in the six years I've been around watching this stuff. If there was one gripe I have about this movie it would be...
Metaphor style rating: Giving your child a badass unique name. Anyone can do it, but it takes real talent to give your kid a badass name like MAX FIGHTMASTER instead of something like Kumquat or Friar. hehe
P.S. Plus points to you if you recognized the Bike From AKIRA, and a copy of Elmer and Basquiat.
REquieme!
(note: apparently we were not shown the final cut of this movie due to technical difficulties. This review will be based on the cut shown to us.)
What the Cynic in Me Expected: Funerals and fighting bureaucracy? Haven't I heard those things 9000 times before?
What Actually Happened: A funny film about... well I have no idea. Other than the fact that it's funny, it's a bit of a mess.
To describe the plot of this film is a bit of a stretch, but I'll try. There's this fashion designer who is killed Andrew Cunanan style. Meanwhile, his distant relative, a Barangay Captain, decides to hold a wake in his honor. MEANWHILE, her estranged gay son decides to help in the burial of an old guy who used to repair her shoes and bags. MEANWHILE MEANWHILE, a lady cannot get her OFW husband's corpse home due to some SNAFU or other.
This is the main problem of the film, actually. With too many major and minor plot threads and barely any connection between the two main plots, it's hard to make sense of the film. Add that to the fact that the film's central theme is a bit vague. What is the theme of the film? Is it about gays (and acceptance of gays) in contemporary society? Is it about the fallacious nature of politics and bureaucracy? Is it about our tendency to glorify anyone just because they a) are Filipino, b) live abroad and C) did something of note, no matter how glamorous or heinous?
I actually find Joanna (the gay son)'s plot more interesting. The guy who repaired her shoes and stuff had no real family, no close relations. In a way, Joanna connected with this guy and identified with him. In a sense, she is helping to bury her old self in every instance that she pushes to get the guy a decent burial. And indeed, in the last act of the film we see just that happen in a metaphorical sense.
The film does have lots of moments of funny. The audience responded well to most of the scenes and delivers on the jokes quite capably. Technically the film is sound.
Again, the film tends to get quite convoluted, and you tend to jump from one thread to another trying to make sense of the film. While entertaining, expect nothing lasting from this one.
Metaphor style rating: The movie Signs. It's hella scary the first time you watch it, but in retrospect a lot of shit doesn't make sense. Replace scary with funny and there you go.
New Breed Films
Ang Katiwala (The Caretaker)
What the Cynic in Me Expected: 2 Hours of Dennis Trillo sweeping floors and washing windows.
What Actually Happened: A well thought out piece about our society and our place in it.
Ruben (Dennis Trillo) is a handyman who gets fired from his job at the local municipal hall mainly due to political reasons. Without much to sustain his wife and son, and with only a small patch of farmland to get by, he decides to take up his uncle's offer to serve as a caretaker of a large house. The house in this case belonged to Manuel L. Quezon, one of the founders of the Philippine Commonwealth, the transitional government that led us to finally taste independence.
As he goes about his job sweeping floors and washing windows, he learns more about this man and what he went through in life (complete with some interesting animated sequences) and starts to identify with him.
Much of the film revolves around this quote by Manuel Quezon himself (and I paraphrase, because I forgot the original wording) : it is better to have a hellish Philippines governed by its own people than to have a paradise-like Philippines governed by the Americans, because, at least with our own power, we can change.
The film, however, sees the situation as a little more complicated. The film takes place around 2008, where our political system and officials are far from the idealistic vision Quezon had noted in his speeches. Ruben's family, including his extended family in Manila, are harassed by communist 'rebels,' government, and other people around them. Change is something that is hard to come by, because the existing systems are so entrenched in our consciousnesses that we cannot imagine any other system. It's this cynical view that I share, to be quite honest. It takes real guts to enact real and lasting change.
Ruben's position as a caretaker mirrors the US' position as our caretaker during the Commonwealth period, as foreshadowed at around the middle part of the movie. And extending the analogy, we simply either do not learn or ignore the lessons passed on to us by the Americans. And extending this analogy to its limit, as the US left when we could stand by our two feet, Ruben's stint in the house ends with an upheaval as shocking as it is unexpected.
Technically the film is well done, and with a very limited cast of characters the acting is superb. There were some humorous moments in between long scenes of Dennis Trillo doing, well, caretaker stuff. Don't get me wrong, the movie never gets boring.
This ended up being one of the better films of the day for me. Go ahead and take a look.
Metaphor style rating: Kinda like rice that gets more delicious as you eat and has meat at the bottom.
Ang Nawawala (What isn't There)
What the Cynic in Me Expected: A movie about a bunch of hipsters falling in love, being not mainstream, listening to indie music and talking about Kerouac. Or something.
What Actually Happened: Basically the above, but really, really well done.
Gibson Bonifacio (Dominic Roco) is a photographer, although I'm not really sure he has a job as one. Anyway, he just up and decided not to talk, ever. There's a reason for this, but I won't spoil it for you guys. Anyway, he returns to the Philippines after studying abroad (how he managed to finish without uttering a single word, well that's a story for another day.)
He meets up with an old friend, stuff happens, and soon he gets to fall in love for the first time. All this in between listening to indie music, looking at paintings, and lounging around in spas. In the meantime, certain aspects of his past and his family's issues begin to unravel.
Seeing the trailer and everything else, I thought I would totally hate this film. Why? Because EWWWWW HIPSTERS. But surpringly, it delivers in just the right ways. This film is actually my favorite film of the festival so far.
The best part of the film is the music. Throughout the film you hear songs from various names in the indie music scene. I have no idea who most of them are (but hooray for Hannah + Gabi) but they fit into every scene very well. An apt comparison would be to last year's Ang Sayaw ng Dalawang Kaliwang Paa. Because the music is excellent, every scene has this palpable emotion that you rarely see in any Filipino film, anywhere. This is one film where I'd gladly purchase the soundtrack.
Visually the film delivers as well. You often see shots of slums and stuff in independent films, but here the cityscapes and roads show another side of Manila, and it is damn impressive. A later sequence during New Year's Day offers some great visuals too.
The characters are likeable and are not one dimensional, partly thanks to good performances all around. While it would have been nice to flesh out everybody, you have to prune some story here and there to make the story flow better, so it's not really a problem.
It's a great film, and one of the most unique that I have seen in the six years I've been around watching this stuff. If there was one gripe I have about this movie it would be...
Metaphor style rating: Giving your child a badass unique name. Anyone can do it, but it takes real talent to give your kid a badass name like MAX FIGHTMASTER instead of something like Kumquat or Friar. hehe
P.S. Plus points to you if you recognized the Bike From AKIRA, and a copy of Elmer and Basquiat.
REquieme!
(note: apparently we were not shown the final cut of this movie due to technical difficulties. This review will be based on the cut shown to us.)
What the Cynic in Me Expected: Funerals and fighting bureaucracy? Haven't I heard those things 9000 times before?
What Actually Happened: A funny film about... well I have no idea. Other than the fact that it's funny, it's a bit of a mess.
To describe the plot of this film is a bit of a stretch, but I'll try. There's this fashion designer who is killed Andrew Cunanan style. Meanwhile, his distant relative, a Barangay Captain, decides to hold a wake in his honor. MEANWHILE, her estranged gay son decides to help in the burial of an old guy who used to repair her shoes and bags. MEANWHILE MEANWHILE, a lady cannot get her OFW husband's corpse home due to some SNAFU or other.
This is the main problem of the film, actually. With too many major and minor plot threads and barely any connection between the two main plots, it's hard to make sense of the film. Add that to the fact that the film's central theme is a bit vague. What is the theme of the film? Is it about gays (and acceptance of gays) in contemporary society? Is it about the fallacious nature of politics and bureaucracy? Is it about our tendency to glorify anyone just because they a) are Filipino, b) live abroad and C) did something of note, no matter how glamorous or heinous?
I actually find Joanna (the gay son)'s plot more interesting. The guy who repaired her shoes and stuff had no real family, no close relations. In a way, Joanna connected with this guy and identified with him. In a sense, she is helping to bury her old self in every instance that she pushes to get the guy a decent burial. And indeed, in the last act of the film we see just that happen in a metaphorical sense.
The film does have lots of moments of funny. The audience responded well to most of the scenes and delivers on the jokes quite capably. Technically the film is sound.
Again, the film tends to get quite convoluted, and you tend to jump from one thread to another trying to make sense of the film. While entertaining, expect nothing lasting from this one.
Metaphor style rating: The movie Signs. It's hella scary the first time you watch it, but in retrospect a lot of shit doesn't make sense. Replace scary with funny and there you go.
Director's Showcase
Kalayaan (Wildlife)
What the Cynic in Me Expected: 2 Hours of Ananda Everingham exercising, eating raw eggs and fapping to porn.
What Actually Happened: 2 Hours of Ananda Everingham exercising, eating raw eggs and fapping to pOHMYGODWHATTHEHELLISTHATSHIT
Julius Macaraeg (Ananda Everingham) is stationed on one of the largest islands of the Spratlys, a resource-rich island chain that is a subject of dispute between China and the Philippines. Taking place during the 2001 EDSA Revolution, his extended bouts of isolation slowly makes him lose his sanity... or is something else going on in this island that no one expected?
This movie is slooooooow. It's a slow burn for most of the movie until the last part. I've watched my share of slow movies and this one takes its place in the slow movies pantheon. It's a character study at times, then part horror, then part psychological drama. It's definitely not for everybody, as evidenced by the number of people walking out in the middle of the film. But the itneresting thing about it is when shit does hit the fan, it's terribly interesting. And extremely weird.
There are a lot of shots of the Thai Everingham (later joined by Zanjoe Marudo and some other person whose name I cant remember for the life of me) running across the beach, fishing, swimming, drinking and playing beach basketball. Ananda Everingham has like five lines in the entire film, which is explained in the story via traumatic past experience. In reality, he probably would have a heavy accent and make his supposedly Filipino character hard to believe. The silence adds to the loneliness and isolation depicted in the film, and is surprisingly quite effective.
Technically the film is okay, but some shots are too dark to see anything. Although this is supposed to build suspense,it doesn't work as well as it should in some parts where you see literally nothing.
As for the connection between the EDSA 2 thing and this situation? I'd make some sort of metaphor connecting duty on these islands with the Presidency or something like that, but it would turn out too contrived for my taste, so I pass.
The ending is simply something that has to be seen to be believed, and whose interpretation relies heavily on the viewer. That is, if you decide to slog through a lot just to get there.
Metaphor style rating: A walk through quicksand only to reach a place where the air is LSD.
Bonus Points: If you recognized Yua Aida as the lady in the videos Julius was fapping to.
EXTRA Lord of Hentai Bonus Points: If you recognized the video as one of her S1 videos, probably Samantha / Yua Aida Vol.3.
Kalayaan (Wildlife)
What the Cynic in Me Expected: 2 Hours of Ananda Everingham exercising, eating raw eggs and fapping to porn.
What Actually Happened: 2 Hours of Ananda Everingham exercising, eating raw eggs and fapping to pOHMYGODWHATTHEHELLISTHATSHIT
Julius Macaraeg (Ananda Everingham) is stationed on one of the largest islands of the Spratlys, a resource-rich island chain that is a subject of dispute between China and the Philippines. Taking place during the 2001 EDSA Revolution, his extended bouts of isolation slowly makes him lose his sanity... or is something else going on in this island that no one expected?
This movie is slooooooow. It's a slow burn for most of the movie until the last part. I've watched my share of slow movies and this one takes its place in the slow movies pantheon. It's a character study at times, then part horror, then part psychological drama. It's definitely not for everybody, as evidenced by the number of people walking out in the middle of the film. But the itneresting thing about it is when shit does hit the fan, it's terribly interesting. And extremely weird.
There are a lot of shots of the Thai Everingham (later joined by Zanjoe Marudo and some other person whose name I cant remember for the life of me) running across the beach, fishing, swimming, drinking and playing beach basketball. Ananda Everingham has like five lines in the entire film, which is explained in the story via traumatic past experience. In reality, he probably would have a heavy accent and make his supposedly Filipino character hard to believe. The silence adds to the loneliness and isolation depicted in the film, and is surprisingly quite effective.
Technically the film is okay, but some shots are too dark to see anything. Although this is supposed to build suspense,it doesn't work as well as it should in some parts where you see literally nothing.
As for the connection between the EDSA 2 thing and this situation? I'd make some sort of metaphor connecting duty on these islands with the Presidency or something like that, but it would turn out too contrived for my taste, so I pass.
The ending is simply something that has to be seen to be believed, and whose interpretation relies heavily on the viewer. That is, if you decide to slog through a lot just to get there.
Metaphor style rating: A walk through quicksand only to reach a place where the air is LSD.
Bonus Points: If you recognized Yua Aida as the lady in the videos Julius was fapping to.
EXTRA Lord of Hentai Bonus Points: If you recognized the video as one of her S1 videos, probably Samantha / Yua Aida Vol.3.
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