Cinema One Originals: Woman of the Ruins (2013 Entry)

It's time for the Cinema One Originals film fest, and despite a ridiculously busy schedule, I've decided to take some time off and watch a few films. Before tackling this year's entries, let's start with something from last year.

Woman of the Ruins starts with a passage from the Book of Revelations, which pretty much sets the tone for the rest of the piece. It takes place in an isolated island after an unknown cataclysm.

The island is populated with a number of characters, including young Sabel (Chanel Latorre,) who is attracted to Pasyon (Art Acuna), who pines for his lost wife Maria. An elder who was alive during the cataclysm (Peque Gallaga) watches over the people of the island. Then Maria mysteriously returns and things really start getting interesting.

The look of Woman in the Ruins is fitting. The film is viewed through this grainy filter which really adds to the overall presentation. We see the husks of houses and buildings as testaments to a ruined world.

But it may be telling that the most 'ruined' aspect of the community of this film is the community themselves. Like the survivors in the bible quote mentioned above, you can say that these people been left on earth for a reason. (There are many ways of interpreting the passage, but I'll use this one for the sake of comparison.) These people are not saints. Instead of adapting and thriving, they rot underneath old precepts and norms. The physical and mental torture of one character is largely ignored because of these traditions, and the act that serves as an impetus for the last part of the film is left to gain momentum because of sticking to tradition and superstition.

There is a lack of physical religious imagery in the film. Try looking for a cross, a picture of a saint, or some religious statue - you can't find anything like that. But I feel the religious allegories are with the characters themselves - in my interpretation, perhaps the characters' names carry some sort of religious meaning within them.

Woman in the Ruins is a parable of sorts, a twisted tale of people caught in their own purgatory, with no clear way out. It's atmospheric, at times slow, but worth a watch.