Cinemalaya 2015 Opening Ceremonies Talk

I can't sleep so I might as well write this one up. I didn't bring my fancy schmancy camera so I'll use rage comics and MS paint to describe what happened.

Generally, the opening ceremonies of Cinemalaya are festive to be sure, but in my experience you can skip them. they usually consist of a few trailers, a few speeches, and maybe a performance of the Cinemalaya theme song. This year was kinda special, however. The moment I heard that the Philippine Philharmonic Orchestra was somehow involved, I was excited as fuck. It turned out to be one of the most memorable Opening Ceremonies I have ever attended.

My trip to CCP was pretty uneventful, but on the way there was this lady with a Hello Kitty band aid eyepatch. I thought that was kinda weird. I arrived at the CCP and made it up to the balcony, where I secured a seat right in the middle. When I watch movies, I don't mind which row I sit in, although I do prefer to be somewhere in the middle if possible.

The audience was your typical young crowd. Maybe mass comm or arts majors looking for a reaction paper. Some are probably production staff or actors for Taklub. Some movie directors here and there. There are probably a handful of cinephiles and media people. Of course, this being a movie by Nora Aunor, there were a ton of Noranians around.

I sat next to this dude who kept on fiddling with his DSLR. It was kinda distracting but I didn't mind.

that's me on the right. Yes I look like a hobo

There was one time where he tried taking pictures of a picture on someone else's cellphone with his DSLR. Why would anyone do that!? Computers, how the fuck do they work, right? Anyway he slept through most of Taklub and didn't touch the camera after the usher told him to cut it, so we're cool.

I gave him a beret to make him look more classy.

Anyway, there were two speeches this year, the first was festival director Chris Millado, who explained this year's theme and slogan, "Expanding Horizons." Pretty run of the mill stuff.

It's at https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mqjENqZlBhc

Afterwards, Laurice Guillen Feleo was up. She talked about this festival being the transition year, and explained the new system: after this festival ends, the 2016 finalists are announced, at the same time the festival is open to entries for the 2017 edition. So everyone has a year to finish their shit, and there's no more New Breed and Director's Showcase. In terms of securing money, it takes more time to secure grants, more time to polish the final product and so on. It might give way for more ambitious projects in the future. I'm kinda excited where this is going to take us as moviegoers. 

She also discussed the rumors floating around (remember last year, the festival looked to be on life support.) Hopefully whatever problems they had last year, they worked it all out with the directors. I'm personally all for artistic freedom for filmmakers and I hope this new iteration expands, not restricts, that freedom.

There was a short clip of the ten short film entries in competition. Finally the orchestra was up.

IT WAS FUCKING AWESOME.

Freddie Mercury was conducting.

Basically the orchestra played musical suites from selected films encompassing the past ten years of Cinemalaya, while showing clips from a ton of Cinemalaya entries on the screen. I'm not sure if they showed clips from ALL of the entries (I don't remember seeing anything from Teoriya, Astig or S6parados) but I saw some of the lesser known films like Ligaw Liham, Still Life, Rekruit, Ranchero, Namets, Boses, Gulong, and Intoy Syokoy ng Kalye Marino to name a few, alongside some of the better known entries like Sana Dati, Bwakaw, Ang Babae sa Septic Tank, Ang Nawawala, Transit, etc.

I admit that I only find a few Cinemalaya musical cues really memorable, but I didn't care. Of course the Philippine Philharmonic was awesome as always.There was a short pause around the time when the orchestra started playing the theme to Ang Babae Sa Septic Tank (!!!!!!!) which may or may not be a glitch, but at this point I really don't care. There was a short clip of Ekstra which was applauded, which was followed by a clip of Nora Aunor from last year's Hustisya, which (given that a good chunk of the audience were composed of Noranians) was met with cheers and applause.

Around the third suite (I think this was the suite from Transit) the music swelled, then it hit me.

I've been watching this shit for the better part of ten years. 

All the emotions and nostalgia flooded back at that moment, and you could swear ninjas cutting onions suddenly appeared out of nowhere. I'm a grown ass man, damnit. Thankfully I also have long hair that can hide such tears. No bawling or sobbing - one manly tear fell from my cheek. (Okay, maybe two.)

The last part was an orchestra-backed rendition of the Cinemalaya theme song, which was pretty nice, although I couldn't hear some of the lines being sung. Thanks to the orchestra, there was limited space to dance in, so not a lot of dancing was happening. I still prefer the original Grace Nono version, but this gets a pass.

Anyway, that was my Opening Ceremonies experience this year. This is the only year so far where I've deemed the Opening Ceremonies to be something worth talking about. I hope that this says something about the festival and the movies I'll be seeing ahead.

I'll see you at the movies.