Bambi (Vice Ganda) works as an OFW in Taiwan. She's been working multiple jobs for many years in order to renovate their large family house. After not renewing a work contract, Bambi decides to return home to start a business. Unfortunately, Bambi finds the family house no better than it was when they left, thanks to a string of bad financial decisions from Bambi's younger brother Biboy (Jhong Hilario).
That description may seem like this is an outright drama, but Jun Lana manages to make a bit of magic in this case: And the Breadwinner Is... is just as much a comedy as Vice Ganda's other films, until it suddenly whacks you in the head with some top tier drama. Lana's use of the camera, working in tandem with DP Carlo Mendoza, is a breath of fresh air in an industry where certain types of standard coverage (shot reverse shot scenes mainly) constitute the norm. Of note is the film's emotional climax, where the camera weaves between characters and each frame also visually portrays their relationships with each other. This is the type of stuff that is shown in filmmaking classes as an example of what to do.
And the content of that climactic scene pretty much encapsulates the film's central thesis, in an argument where everyone kind of has a valid point: why do breadwinners often exist in the singular? Why can't a family help each other as a team during trying times? The characters of And the Breadwinner Is... have the choice to leave the roles they are currently in, though that's easier said than done. And it's not as if they want to stay - these people have tried their hardest to escape, but that only illuminates something deeply broken in Philippine society - that for a lot of people, it is very hard, if not near impossible to pull themselves up from the ground when they've stumbled. It is one of the ways where our society (and government) has failed to take care of its people.
If there is one thing I wish the film could have addressed better is the way it jumps around from one thing to another. The transitions between the film's three acts is very much evident: for example, a certain bread related subplot fades into the background once the drama starts ramping up, and while it's partially alluded to in the film's mid-credits scene, it was a great opportunity to tie everything together. Still, I didn't expect to get emotional at a Vice Ganda film, but here we are.
*
There are certain aspects of streaming culture that disturb me. "Content" is a word that properly describes what is created from this activity; a word that implies a soulless, artless product made to be consumed. In the process, many have created their content in ways that are unethical and disrespectful, and there's even a collective term for it: nuisance streaming. And even with the biggest creators of content, there's a soullessness to the whole thing (ever watched a MrBeast video?) so it's weirdly appropriate that the pushback to that soullessness in this next film is done by actual souls. Souls of the damned, yes, but souls nonetheless.
Strange Frequencies: Taiwan Killer Hospital (that title is a mouthful, but let's ride along) is a faithful adaptation of Jung Bum-shik's 2018 film Gonjiam: Haunted Asylum. Not faithful in the sense that it's a shot for shot remake (it's definitely not), but it mostly keeps the same story beats with new scares and setups. That has its advantages and disadvantages, as we will see.
First off, the film takes place in Taiwan, and not in the Philippines, even though we have no shortage of haunted locales in our country and the ghost hunter genre of TV media isn't uncommon. On the other hand, that lends an extra dimension to the whole thing: in the course of creating content (because that's what this is) people go to foreign places and confer no respect to whatever is going on. Many of the characters touch things and openly mock the spirits there, despite being told by a local that that would be a very bad idea. Additionally, the fact that the nature supernatural entities or weirdo cults that have inhabited the hospital isn't explained makes the whole thing a bit scarier (the scariest, and also the silliest, parts of the film for me are a sequence of old black and white pictures.)
At the center of Strange Frequencies is Enrique Gil, who embarks on this supernatural expedition as a career boost. The film does have a throwaway line at the end (which if I recall was not in the original) that comments on the lengths people will go for fame, and how the existence of the film is driven by metrics, as Gil won't abandon the production until he gets 3 million views, even when people are dying left and right around him. As with the other actors involved in the production, I wish the film leaned in even more on creating a sense of verisimilitude - commenting on Enrique Gil's current post-loveteam status, or expanding on the comments on the stream when Jane de Leon asked for help. Granted, yes, audiences probably already know that this is fake, but putting some more doubt into that would be, I think, a good idea. As an aside, Jane de Leon's performance is my favorite among all the cast, if only for the fact that she had a lot of great terrified expressions in this film.
Is it scarier than the original? Maybe not. But I think it's a fun time at the cinema, especially with friends.
*
Whenever you watch a video of a person getting their just desserts or receiving the karma that they deserve, do you ever wonder what drove them to do the things that they did? Or do you feel that whatever the circumstances may be, they got what's coming to them? The idea of justice has many definitions depending on who you ask. For many, justice is retributive, driven by revenge: whatever was taken away needs to be paid back. Those who commit crimes are punished. For others, justice seeks to correct, whether it be correcting the effects of the crime, or correcting the behavior in the person who committed it. The act of 'correction' as it is used in many prisons (i.e. 'correction facilities') seldom reflects the realities in these places, which function more to imprison than to correct. There is, however, a definition of justice that stuck with me while watching Zig Dulay's Green Bones, and I'd like to share it with you all here.
The film starts from the perspective of Xavier Gonzaga (Ruru Madrid), a young and idealistic police officer who is sent to the San Fabian Prison and Penal Farm to work as a prison guard. He is surprised at how relatively laid back and peaceful everything is, and is wary of the various prisoners who live there. One prisoner is particularly infamous: Dom (Dennis Trillo) a man convicted of killing his sister and niece, disposing the body of the latter in a nearby river. Ruru feels a special kind of hatred for Dom, as his own sister was murdered when he was a child. Soon enough, Xavier suspects something fishy is going on between Dom and the inmates, leading to a confrontation between the two.
Green Bones is simply a solidly made, well written film about the ways we view justice and people deprived of liberty. Its two-part structure emphasizes the idea of empathy - in that singular perspectives (while understandable) are seldom the entirety of a story. Empathy should be the center of justice, though that's not an easy thing to do, as there are truly heinous people in the world who commit truly heinous acts. For people who want to better themselves, who acknowledge the gravity of their crime, empathy from all sides leads to true 'correction.' Justice, Green Bones posits, should be liberative, a path to goodness being a way to seek freedom - not just physically, but also spiritually. In a world where we're slowly losing faith in people, works like Green Bones are an impassioned defense for the goodness inherent in most of us.
Granted, there are many intricacies about the justice system and its systemic corruption that are left unaddressed here, but in this case, it would be superfluous to include them all. Green Bones is a highlight of the year, and Dennis Trillo's performance is one for the ages. After a long stint in TV, this return to the cinema cements him as one of the country's top actors.
*
Speaking of retributive justice, there are some people that don't deserve redemption, their evil so pervasive and unchecked that the normal mechanisms of justice simply don't work anymore. Dan Villegas' Uninvited is one of the best of the year, a thrilling, engaging tale of taking matters into your own hands. More than any other horror film this year, it chilled me to the bone.
Lilia (Vilma Santos) comes to a lavish birthday party being held for Guilly Vega (Aga Muhlach). It's quite clear from the onset that she's there to take revenge. The film slowly reveals, over the next hour, why Lilia is taking revenge.
People born in the eighties or are familiar with goings-on in the nineties might recognize similarities with Guilly's crimes and the crimes of another, well publicized case that took place during that time. A former fellow faculty member of mine was actually involved in that case, and the stories I heard from that time horrified even myself - and I work with gory stuff on a regular basis. That's the scariest thing about Uninvited - no amount of ghosts or supernatural phenomena is scarier than the fact that the things that happen in this movie actually happened in real life.
Guilly himself is the epitome of unchecked, unlimited power, power that is condoned and tolerated. Aga Muhlach has played villains before - including serial killers - but he plays an unimaginably evil character here, perhaps the most evil. And this evil is not only seen in the way he acts around other people - his sliminess reminds me of a certain foreign politician - it's also in the way the people around him react (or more accurately, the way they don't react) to his actions, and in the way his henchmen help him commit that evil. His daughter Nicole (Nadine Lustre) puts it best when she tells Lilia why she condones a monster - it's because she loves his money.
The ever-versatile Vilma Santos has had her share of dramatic roles in the past, but I haven't seen her like this in a long time, if not ever. The way she looks down on the party crowd below exudes a tranquil fury that is ready to explode at any moment. This is a woman with nothing to lose. Uninvited at times segues into action, and Vilma is up to the challenge, but most of the film is about building tension and Villegas lets it build and build. I was glued to that screen for the entire time.
Uninvited tends to laser focus itself on Lilia's revenge, leaving several plotlines by the wayside. But those plotlines are merely the effect of an excellent, well realized world. It's still one of my favorite films of the year.
*
One of my favorite, burgeoning sub-genres of romance cinema originated with the 2000 film Il Mare, one of my favorite films of all time. It involves two people, separated by distance and time, communicating with each other through a medium (in this case, letters through a magic mailbox). This formula has been repeated over the years, even in Philippine cinema (a recent example being JP Habac's Love You Long Time (2023)).
At first glance, Crisanto Aquino's My Future You looks derivative, cribbing from films like Il Mare and Makoto Shinkai's Your Name (2016). But then it transforms into something different in its second half, becoming a film about loving what you have in the here and now.
Lex (Seth Fedelin) is an artist with a loving family and a tragic past. Karen (Francine Diaz) is a recent graduate who wants to work with her dad and not her stepfather (Christian Vasquez). During one starry night, the two wish upon a comet and weird things start to happen. First, a mysterious dating app shows up on their laptops. Normally, I wouldn't install strange apps that magically appear on my computer, but I guess Norton Antivirus didn't detect anything. Lex and Karen meet online, but are unable to meet in real life. The reason: Lex lives in 2009, while Karen lives in good ol' 2024.
The proceedings are very, very cute, and any weirdness that ensues (as this is effectively a May-December romance with extra steps), I can live with because of time shenanigans. Seth and Francine make a good love team, though my favorite couple in the film has to be Lex's parents, played by Bodjie Pascua and Peewee O'Hara. (Their love team name will be PeeJie.) In any case, both Lex and Karen deal with their relationship in an open, emotionally mature manner that, considering the toxicity of other movie relationships in 2024, is a breath of fresh air.
But at the heart of My Future You is the idea that we change the lives of the people around us even with small actions. Not only that, but sometimes a family doesn't have to strictly follow a set configuration - as long as there is happiness, understanding and love between all parties, that is all one will ever need.
*
Fairytales don’t often concern themselves with the details: once it’s happily ever after, that’s it. Anything else is in the domain of speculation (and fanmade fiction). One could see Michael Tuviera’s The Kingdom as an example of that, a modern day fairytale built on one of the rarer subgenres of Filipino cinema: alternate history fiction. If you’ve read a Harry Turtledove novel, been vaguely aware of the Marvel multiverse or watched/read The Man in the High Castle, that’s pretty much what it alternate history fiction is: stories that begin with a question: what if?
The question The Kingdom asks is tantalizing: what would happen if the Philippines was never colonized? Apparently, it would be a Malay kingdom named Kalayaan, ruled by kings or Lakan who, if legend is to be believed, has the blood of Bathala in their veins. The incumbent monarch is Makisig (Vic Sotto), who has ruled the land of Kalayaan for many years. Social status in Kalayaan is determined by how many tattoos you have, and Makisig has them in spades. Makisig’s three children, Bagwis (Sid Lucero), Matimyas (Christine Reyes) and Lualhati (Sue Ramirez) are set to succeed their father, but a kidnapping complicates matters and gives hints towards something bigger and much more sinister than intially thought.
The world Tuviera and his team build is nothing short of spellbinding: everything from set designs and costumes is immersive. A few janky CGI shots may not be the best, but they are the exception to the rule. Nestor Abrogena, who did the PD work for this film, deserves an award. The lore, on the other hand, isn’t all completely filled out: why does multicultural Kalayaan with many different tribes feel monolithic? What happened to the Muslim tribes in the south? What’s the deal with some Spanish names in a country (Kiko from Francisco?) that wasn’t touched by the Spaniards? This isn’t necessarily a bad thing: these questions and gaps in the lore don’t mean that the film is bad, it means that it’s fertile ground for expansion. Films like The Kingdom should encourage questions and discourse, and judging from Vic Sotto’s penchant for cribbing from popular properties in his many projects (the Dune and Game of Thrones inspiration is not lost on me) there might be plans on spinoffs or sequels to expand the lore.
This leads me to something I noticed in The Kingdom that stops what is already a good film from being amazing. In short scenes, we see that Kalayaan is no utopia: its citizens suffer under feudal rule, oppressed by those in higher positions of power, and the governments meant to serve the people are as inefficient and corrupt as the systems we already have. Sulo (Piolo Pascual) seems to be the voice of the masses and their struggles, and as the film goes on he is given an opportunity to try to rectify this. On the other hand, the way the film ends, while satisfying in its own way, leaves the larger problems of Kalayaan unsolved. I can excuse it partly because The Kingdom feels like a fairytale, and like I said earlier, fairytales don’t concern themselves with details after they’ve ended, leaving the rest to our imagination. And, fingers crossed, Tuviera and co. may not even have to leave it to our imagination, as there is definitely potential to continue the story of Kalayaan for many years to come.
The Kingdom is still a very entertaining film and one that is genuinely engaging, its fully realized world a fertile ground for the imagination of audiences. Like last year’s Mallari, it’s audacious in its scope and ambitious in an industry that wants to play it safe, a relative rarity in mainstream Philippine cinema.
*
I found myself physically ill while watching Richard Somes' Topakk. Not because the film is shot at night in a dark warehouse, though that doesn't help. (The very bad projection at Robinsons Manila didn't help either, and I might have to rewatch this at a place with a bulb that's at least been replaced since the Arroyo administration). Not because the acting was bad, as Arjo Atayde and Sid Lucero constitutes one of my favorite protagonist - antagonist pairings. Not because of the weird color grading that made everyone look like red-skinned devils. (It might also be a theater issue, anyway avoid Rob Manila Cinema 1).
No, I was nauseous watching Topakk because of its camerawork, which seems to have been operated by a jittery Chihuahua with Parkinsons, high on a kilo of meth. There was one point where our protagonist Miguel (Atayde) is wrestling with a big guy. I couldn't tell, because it was too dark. The camera wasn't focused on their writhing bodies, it was lazily moving around in an oval like a lazy susan. Handheld action camerawork is not bad per se - but if the camerawork is bad to the point where you can no longer see the choreography, there's really no point to anything anymore. There were points in this film where I was forced to stare at the ceiling because I was getting nauseous - though if I were to look I probably wouldn't see anything anyway. This is an action shooting style popularized by The Bourne Trilogy films, and it needs to go extinct. For examples of good action cinematography, there's always Gareth Evans' The Raid duology and Yugo Sakamoto's Baby Assassins trilogy. Heck. direct to video Chinese action films are better shot than Topakk, and I'm baffled at the responses to the film that call this a good action movie. Have you ever seen a good action movie in your fucking life?
As for this film's story, there isn't much of one, but this is an action film. Who cares. Miguel is an ex-military man notorious for going on berserker rages that end up with lots of dead bodies. He is hired as a security guard for a warehouse. Two drug runners (Julia Montes and Kokoy de Santos) end up in his warehouse, chased by a gang of drug policemen trying to cover up their dirty work. The two runners ask for Miguel's help, and after some hemming and hawing, he obliges. The rest of the film is Miguel securing the fuck out of that warehouse. I hope his boss gives him a raise.
My favorite scene of Topakk is at the very end. For one, it's not shot at night and it's not shot in a dark warehouse. Two, the camera, while still handheld at times, focuses on the two characters in the center of the fight. You can tell what's happening, and the fighting tells a story. That's the thing: Richard Somes can stage some very good action scenes, We Will Not Die Tonight being a decent example, albeit with similar camerawork to this. And that's what guts me about this film. I should be celebrating this film as I love the genre and I love cheesy, gory action, but (and I can't believe I'm saying this) this year's Banjo was better shot than this.
*
Chito Roño's Espantaho doesn't feel like a horror movie, although it has horror elements. Though it has the sensibilities of some of Roño's film and tv horror work from the 2000s (and 2010s), it reminds me a lot of his 2023 film Ang Mga Kaibigan ni Mama Susan, with which it shares a loose, almost experimental structure. It might even be more accurate to call this a mishmash of a kabit movie and a horror film, or perhaps a director entering an experimental phase. It's seldom scary, if at all, but it's kind of fascinating, and even a bit goofy.
Monet (Judy Ann Santos) has supernatural abilities. It's implied that she has a third eye and can see ghosts and other supernatural phenomena. She lives at her father's house with her son Keith (Kian Co), the ghostly apparition of her mother Rosa (Lorna Tolentino) and her boyfriend (JC Santos). Monet's father Pablo has just died and they begin the pasiyam, which entails praying over the course for nine days. However, strange disappearances begin to occur, disappearances that are complicated with the arrival of Adele (Chanda Romero) and her two children. You see, Monet is Pablo's illegitimate child, and Adela still resents Rosa for taking her husband away from her. As Adele plans on selling Pablo's house, effectively leaving Monet and her son homeless, the disappearances continue.
Espantaho takes on a somewhat feminist track, as it can be read as a tale about women, mostly victims of the selfish actions of men, taking back control over their lives. It is a story about the many ways women are "haunted," whether literally or figuratively, by the ghosts of men. Adele and Rosa are blameless, perhaps their only mistake being falling in love with an adulterous man. The person (or persons) behind the supernatural goings on are also men driven by self-interest. It is only when the women of the family reach across the aisle and come together when the evil is held back. Espantaho can also be read as a treatise on the kabit film itself, where the act of cheating becomes a specter that claims victims beyond the central parties involved.
In any case, it's fun seeing Judy Ann Santos, Chanda Romero and Lorna Tolentino flex their acting chops here. Though Chito Roño's made better films, Espantaho is certainly fascinating enough that it warrants some attention.
*
Pain - whether physical or emotional - is unpleasant, and many of us understandably spend our entire lives trying to avoid it. Lynlyn (Julia Barretto) has an ability that makes this easier - when she touches a person, she can determine if that person will have a positive or negative impact on her life. She meets Woody (Carlo Aquino), an eccentric who has moved to Lynlyn's hometown in Karatsu, Saga Prefecture and takes a liking to him. All is well until she touches him and she gets an ominous premonition...
In Karatsu there exists a pine grove called Niji no Matsubara (虹の松原, Pine Grove of Rainbows), a pine forest planted by a feudal lord who lived in Karatsu in the early Edo period. It was a natural barrier, meant by the people who planted it to protect the city from strong winds and rain. But the forest is not an impenetrable barrier, and as such it does not stop everything from passing through; some winds and rain still make their way to Karatsu. Hold Me Close is a love story that tells us not to close our hearts to pain; that pain is an inevitability of loving, because love does not last forever.
It's certainly an interesting premise, and in theory it's something I can get behind. What prevents Hold Me Close from being any good lies in the details. For one, the dialogue is all sorts of weird and off putting. Lynlyn switches being warm and friendly to being robotic, and it's not Julia Barretto's fault as I think she's a good actress. Woody, on the other hand, feels like an emotionally draining obsessive who is so desperate for love, he doesn't care where that love may come from. He's not exactly the kind of guy I can root for, and I didn't find any chemistry in their pairing because of that.
Despite its capable technical aspects, Hold Me Close is more egregiously written than Barretto's 2019 collab with director Jason Paul Laxamana, Between Maybes, which also takes place in Japan. This one outright leans into an obsessive love for Japanese culture, as if it was written by a weeb or an overly zealous otaku. The various Japanese phrases inserted in the dialogue are cringe, and during one moment where Lynlyn is attacked, her cries of tasukete (help me!) are reflected in the subtitles as "tasukete," as if MMFF audiences will pick that up. It honestly felt like watching an anime fansub from 2005, and I do not mean that positively because it takes place during a very serious scene.
Though it has some potential, Hold Me Close didn't hold up to expectations. がっかりだよ。
*
And finally, a film that harkens back to a legendary entry in this film festival's 50-year history. The 1982 edition of the MMFF saw the release of Ishmael Bernal's Himala, considered by many to be one of the greatest Filipino films of all time. Over the years, there have been many remakes of the film in various mediums, but I've always found myself asking, how do you iterate on perfection? Bernal's original is so refined, so definitive, that remaking it would be like walking a tightrope. While I prefer the original version, I am happy to say that Pepe Diokno's Isang Himala is a wonderful adaptation of Bernal's film.
I'm perhaps not the best person to go to about this film, because I'm not that big a fan of musical theater, and I haven't seen the Isang Himala musical, which would probably be a better point of comparison than the 1982 film. In any case, here's what I think: the performances are excellent. The film's cast mostly consists of actors with a theater background, and it shows: for example, Aicelle Santos (who reprises her role from the musical) is incandescent as Elsa - she has such a strong screen presence that it's hard not to look at her during her scenes. She's not the only standout in the film, the whole ensemble is amazing. It was like being blasted by a wall of (good) sound for 2 hours.
Diokno doesn't rely on the stage performances to carry the film, he shoots Isang Himala, rightfully, like a movie, creating a sort of hybrid between the musical and the original. He also decides to film in sets meant to emulate the location of the original, creating an effect of these locales evoking a time and place, but also evoking an alien, otherworldy feeling as the audience looks at them.
There's an attempt to keep things going along, but there are some parts in the middle of some songs where one can really feel the film's extended runtime. Musical fans may not mind (and heck, Wicked is longer than this film) but there's a looseness to the film's flow sometimes that occasionally drags for me.
I go back to my initial question when watching Isang Himala, albeit worded slightly differently: why do you iterate on perfection? The answer to that question is at the very end, where there are words on the screen (and I translate/paraphrase here): we are a country that is given a voice; when will we start to listen? Isang Himala is not (just) a remake, it is a reminder. The original Himala is a film about faith, whether it be in deities or in people, and how a people, left with nothing, yearn for someone to save them. Through its filmmaker character Orly's perspective, it is a film about an artist's responsibility towards the truth, and the role of cinema in our lives. It is a film about how blind faith corrupts and destroys. 42 years ago, in the middle of a dictator's rule, it held meaning; 42 years later, with his son now in power, it is still equally resonant.
