Cinema One Originals: Alamat ni China Doll

Alamat ni China Doll, a collaboration between filmmakers Lav Diaz and Adolfo Alix, is like unraveling a story by hearing second hand accounts: you have a general impression of the story, then people start filling you in the details one by one until you get a hazy picture which may or may not be complete.

China Doll (Angelica Panganiban) is a woman who is hiding under the witness protection program along with her elderly grandmother (Anita Linda) for reasons that are initially not that clear. We then get snippets of her past with her NBI handler (Philip Salvador) and interviews with disgraced investigative journalist Perry Nanali (Cesar Montano). There are also scenes with a mysterious individual (Carlo Aquino) who may be connected with China Doll's past.

If you consider the film to be a puzzle that has you putting together the pieces to tell the story, it's not going to be rewarding if your aim is to get the complete picture; the pieces are incomplete and by the end, you are left wanting more. But whether intentionally ironic or not, knowing the truth is part of one of the issues the movie brings up - how important is unearthing the truth? Does it have to come at the cost of lives?

I was reminded of certain news reports of grisly crimes where news reporters focus, almost voyeur-like, into the suffering of either victims or the bereaved. I remember this uncontrolled zeal rearing its ugly head during the hostage situation at the Quirino Grandstand.

While the search for the truth is there, the actual truth is muddled in between lies and vague memories. We barely learn anything about China Doll herself; we see her caring for her mother but we see little else. We see nothing of the violent acts she is supposed to have been a part of, only the aftermath. We see nothing concrete about what happened to her with Salvador or Montano's characters - only hearsay. In the end, it leaves the viewer a bit disjointed.

Comparing this film to Alix's earlier effort, Porno, the latter film feels a bit more concrete. In theory this film has more of a sense of closure than Porno, since its storyline  (when rearranged in the right way) does not fade away unresolved like some of the three stories of Porno. But it sure seems that way, thanks to the way the story is restructured. The tale at the end is quite appropriate, however, and in a way it's a fitting end to the film. Again, your experience may vary.