Lockdown Diaries April Digest

A lot has happened since the last time I posted, huh? That's probably the understatement of the year. I started this blog as a travel diary of sorts, and now it's the complete opposite. The community quarantine should be a perfect time to sit back and watch a couple of movies, but anxiety makes watching anything a chore. That said, it's okay if your output, whether work or leisure, isn't up to snuff.

I've managed to watch a few things, and I'd like to share that with you guys. Enjoy.

Harana (Bautista, 2012)

A pleasant yet somber mood accompanies Benito Bautista's 2012 documentary Harana, chronicling guitarist Florante Aguilar as he tries to reconnect with his country's musical traditions.  He searches for and finds some of the last few remaining practitioners of Harana, a type of Filipino folk serenade. The idea of Harana fits the whole film, because this is a film of love stories - a man falling in love with his country and culture all over again, artists rediscovering the art that they so love, and, in its purest form, a man awkwardly professing his love through song.

Yet this film's love is also tinged with a kind of wistfulness, towards songs whose names are all but forgotten,  towards an artform that is still slowly dying out. The least we can do, Harana posits, is to remember these men and treasure their art for posterity's sake.

Clan of the White Lotus (Lo Lieh, 1980)

Gordon Liu may have entered mainstream consciousness as Pai Mei in Quentin Tarantino's Kill Bill Volume 2 (2004), but the storied actor has a long filmography that spans decades. In this particular Shaw Brothers film, Lo Lieh's 1980 film Clan of the White Lotus, the movie begins with Liu's character Hung killing a character named Pai Mei (perhaps an in medias res continuation of another Shaw Brothers film, Executioners from Shaolin (1977)). Though Tarantino's inspiration for his character comes from Chinese folklore (perhaps a character that broadly encompasses all these other fictional branchpoints), it's not a stretch to think he saw this movie at some point.

Liu is pitted against Pai Mei's twin: the White Lotus Priest, played by Lo Lieh himself. The priest is nigh invincible, spending most of the movie shrugging off our protagonist's attempts to kill him. He is only defeated when Hung learns the feminine fighting style of Mei-Hsiao (Kara Hui) and the acupuncture techniques of the doctor who treats him. In particular, Hung's training sequences with Mei-Hsiao involve him doing housework and caring for babies. For a movie genre (and time period) steeped in masculinity, it's a surprisingly egalitarian idea.

Violet Evergarden Gaiden: Eternity and the Automemory Doll (Fujita, 2019)

Perhaps it is apt that the last movie I saw in cinemas before the lockdown was Kyoto Animation's Violet Evergarden Gaiden: Eternity and the Automemory Doll, as it starts with a character placed in a sort of isolation - the sort that separates the rich and the poor, or the sheltered and the worldly. There is another kind of separation at play, hinted at in the first act and fleshed out a little more in the second act - the isolation brought upon by suffocating gender roles, where women are trapped in social situations they have little chance of escaping.

Despite all that, the film finds hope in the fashion fans of Violet Evergarden will no doubt be used to: where the act of communication breaks apart any cage and crosses any barrier, and conflict is not won through weapons, but words. Indeed, in the world of Violet Evergarden, words are a means towards freedom.

More posts coming up.

March Movie Digest: Us Again, Hindi Tayo Pwede

NOTE: Spoilers for both films below.

The ghost of a love lost forever becomes more than literal in two recent local films - in both cases, the lost promise of such a love is so strong, it hangs around for dear (after)life, waiting for a chance to gain closure.

In Joy B. Aquino's Us Again, we are treated to a relationship that is said to burn like fireworks. Given its nature, Margie (Jane Oineza) and Mike (RK Bagatsing) have a relationship that should register as fiery and defiant, but unfortunately, it never does get as fiery as that, as the proceedings are pretty restrained, and both Bagatsing and Oineza undersell their love affair. This may be a creative decision, which doesn't exactly help matters.

Things get a little more interesting once we get to the aftermath of that love affair, with both characters dealing with either the consequences of their life decisions, or the fact that they're terrible, even manipulative people. Granted, their flaws made it a bit difficult to root for their relationship, but seeing them process these same flaws in bouts of introspection is entertaining.

That's why the last act is a bit of a disappointment, replacing this self analysis and character development with cheap drama and the tropiest of romance tropes. It's a decision that overly complicates matters and betrays the promise of a flawed, but otherwise interesting film.

The very first thing that I noticed while watching the latest Ricky Lee - Joel Lamangan collaboration Hindi Tayo Pwede is how old fashioned it feels. The dramatic narration reeks of 80's Filipino Cinema, the gender roles of the characters feel dated, and the film's theme song, Nonoy Zuniga's Never Ever Say Goodbye literally comes from the eighties. The film is a relic of a time that has long past, but given Lamangan's penchant for playing to his (older, boomer-ier) audience, this may be a deliberate choice. And for younger audiences, perhaps the starring hunks (and a butt or two) are more than adequate, old fashioned tone be damned.

Hindi Tayo Pwede would have made a great comedy. The problem is, it's a serious romantic drama about a Gabriel, a ghost (Tony Labrusca) who gets jealous over the fact his never-will-be wife is falling in love with her bestie. He doesn't exactly haunt people in the way we are used to, he just sulks and stands there, occasionally looking like a man who recently bathed in several gallons of Pond's whitening cream (the VFX team is kind of inconsistent in this regard.)

The film's dogged stubbornness to connect moving on with letting go of a ghost removes the agency of Gabby, (Lovi Poe), a character who, if she has even just a couple of functioning neurons, should know that people can't get married to ghosts. Why does she wait for Gabriel to give her permission to become single and ready to mingle? The film hinges on a premise that doesn't hold up to common sense. Honestly, she should've called an exorcist from the very start. Or since they're stuck in the eighties, maybe the Ghostbusters could lend a hand.

That's not all. The film overall feels crudely executed. For example, two vehicular accidents are shot the exact same way, which is perhaps the funniest thing in the entire film. The VFX, as previously stated, is inconsistent. It's not as sloppy as Lamangan's other recent works, and it looks like he's trying this time, but everything still comes up a little too short. This is a film that, in the words of Phoemela Baranda's character, probably should've gone "back to the drawing board."

February/March Movie Digest: Tootsies and the Fake, Hell Girl, Ip Man 4

Tootsies and the Fake is based on the two-season TV series Diary of Tootsies, which chronicles the struggles of four friends, all members of the LGBT community. You do not need to have watched the TV show to appreciate the movie, but it helps. Both the TV series and the movie are loud, noisy and silly, but behind all the slapstick is something interesting.

The proceedings are silly enough, but they ramp up to complete wackiness later on: thanks to some sweaty shenanigans, A-list actress Catriona (Araya Hargate) is knocked out of commission, right before an important commercial shoot. To make up for their role in the mishap, the tootsies decide to search for a lookalike who can fill in the role. The manage to find Nam (also Araya Hargate), whose personality is the complete opposite of her doppleganger. Even more shenanigans ensue.

The main plot's tone and direction wouldn't feel out of place in something like the MMFF, and the film's noisiness reminded me of Ivan Payawal's early work, in films such as The Comeback. The tone may prove grating to some audiences, but like the TV show, the film stealthily imparts a couple of lessons on the issues that the LGBT community face in Thai society.

It's the B-plot of Tootsies and the Fake that proves to be the movie's best part: Gus (Paopetch Charoensook) is having a rough patch in his relationship with boyfriend Win (Sawasdiwat Na Ayutthaya). Gus doesn't want kids, but Win has adopted an orphaned niece as his own, and it's creating tension between the two. Meanwhile, Gus' ex Top (Kritsanapoom Pibunsonggram) shows up and complications ensue.

The relationship is treated without judgement and with none of the stereotypes characteristic of other, similar works. Like the TV show, it's a mainstream vehicle to help teach lessons about family life, parental pressures and prejudice in the context of the LGBT community, and for that, if one isn't turned off by the slapstick, Tootsies and the Fake is at least a decent watch.

Based on the four season anime series of the same name, Hell Girl (Jigoku Shoujo) closely follows the formulaic structure of the anime it is based on: various people, wronged in some way or another, use a supernatural website to exact their revenge. If they put the name of the person they have a grudge against on that site, that person will automatically be sent to hell, no questions asked. But there's a catch: when the grudge holder dies, then he or she is sent to hell as well. As one of the characters states, "a deep grudge creates two graves."

The movie and series both raise questions about the nature of revenge, in that it's usually never worth it to exact that revenge - an eye for an eye makes the whole world blind. But director/screenwriter Koji Shiraishi muddles that a bit by making the targets of revenge absolutely despicable people. It's harder to be the better person when there is fear, anger, and emotional proximity to bad circumstances. To the viewer, the feeling of catharsis one gets from seeing these bad people getting their comeuppance comes with a price. Someone bad may have gotten their dues, but someone who is otherwise decent and good is also damned to hell for that "justice" to happen.

And in that sense, Hell Girl (both the anime and series) has always been a tool for criticizing society in general: for it is society that creates these monsters. It is society that condones their heinous acts. The most horrifying thing about Hell Girl isn't the supernatural bringer of death and damnation, it's people - and in a world where ghosts and spirits exist, people may be the worst creature of them all.

Ip Man 4 begins in the grandmaster's twilight years, only a short while before his death from cancer. Because of his son's rebellious behavior, Ip Man (Donnie Yen) decides to take up the invitation of his best student, Bruce Lee (Danny Chan) and go to America, so that he may also find a school for his son.

Like all the other Ip Man films, this fourth installment is very much a nationalistic propaganda piece that proudly toes the party line. With China stepping up their cultural promotion by, for example, making Chinese martial arts mandatory in schools, this is not a surprising development. In one scene, there is dialogue that implies that whether one is a Hong Konger, mainlander or immigrant, they are all under one China. A cartoonishly racist American (Scott Adkins) insults the spirit of Chinese Kung Fu and challenges local martial arts masters. He is just one of many cartoonishly racist Americans in a film that seems to be making a statement about immigration in the present day, also implying that there's no place quite like home (home in this case meaning China.) 

Like in the past three films, Ip Man is tasked to preserve the dignity of his country's culture once again. Strange that the American soldier uses Karate and not an American fighting art, but Ip Man 2 and 3 already had a boxer opponent, so I guess they combined the antagonists of the previous films to spice it up.

That said, there is comfort in formula, and the action scenes are well choreographed thanks to master choreographer Yuen Woo-ping. It's perhaps not the best of the Ip Man films (personal preference is the second and third films) but it's still a pretty fun watch.

February Movie Digest: The Kingmaker, Block Z, On Vodka, Beers and Regrets

"Let them eat cake," Marie Antoinette is reported to have said. She likely didn't say it, but the idea behind that statement does reflect the disconnection the rich experience when they deal with the peasant classes. They do not see themselves as tyrants or overlords, but as benevolent gods, deserving of praise and adoration.

Lauren Greenfield's recent documentaries have explored the relationship with man and wealth. In the Queen of Versailles, we see how the accumulation of wealth has changed people who have come from otherwise humble backgrounds. Materialism is a peculiar drug. Perhaps that's how she initially approached the subject of her latest documentary, The Kingmaker - Imelda Marcos is most known in the western world for her shoe collection, itself a staggering display of wealth at the people's expense. But in the middle of the documentary, the narrative evolves, stumbling upon something greater in scope. The Kingmaker is a film about wealth in the context of power, where one begets the other and vice versa. Thus it is in the best interest of powerful and wealthy people to hold on to that power as much as they can, even if it is to the detriment of the truth, or human rights, or democracy itself. This lends the film a resonance that is not just specific to our own country, but to authoritarian regimes and oligarchies all over the world. (It makes one wonder how the film will be perceived in the west, and how their preconceptions of the Marcoses will change after watching.)

To any Filipino who has at least the tiniest shred of sociopolitical consciousness, the documentary will not offer any new information. It is, however, a reminder that vigilance is the price of a free society. The documentary understandably only scratches the surface of the rabbit hole that is Philippine politics; it only lightly touches on the nature of patronage politics, the cultural vulnerabilities of the Filipino people that make families like the Marcoses happen, and the failure of our government to learn the lessons of the first EDSA Revolution. Perhaps most damning are the supporters and the sycophants who, despite being taken for a ride, willingly partake in the Queen's cake, frosting and all.

It's very hard to botch a zombie movie in terms of the fun one receives from watching it; there's always something fun one can latch on to despite the badness, whether it be schadenfreude for unsympathetic characters or just overall cheesiness. Mikhail Red's Block Z isn't terrible, but it feels superficial, a xerox of a xerox of several other, better zombie movies.

The film starts out like a highschool/teen movie. Stereotypes abound, with jocks, nerds, activists and student council members occupying the narrative space. Stereotypes by themselves are not bad, as they could be used as a microcosmic reflection of society. Indeed, the zombie genre itself, through the direction of masters such as the late George Romero, has been used to lampshade certain truths about our society, and Red himself has used genre-defying filmmaking to do similar things with films like Birdshot or Neomanila.

Unfortunately, Block Z feels too safe and surface-level to be of any lasting impact in terms of discourse. And even if judged by the basic merits of a zombie movie, a lot of things don't hold up that well to scrutiny. In well-paced movies like Train to Busan, there's a linearity to the group's objectives that gives the goings-on a sense of urgency. On the other hand, in Block Z, the script awkwardly tries - and fails - to give our characters a sense of time or space - the map of the campus is confusing and unclear, and at times hours pass before the group makes any sort of progress. In effect, neither time nor tension is felt. When our protagonists start dying off, few deaths register as sympathetic, and any melodramatic moments after such deaths feel shoehorned in. Other than that, the script is full of redundant or conflicting information, with random moments that feel out of place.

To its credit, the film manages to elicit an excellent performance from Joshua Garcia, but his talents feel wasted on this film. Block Z may be an entertaining midnight screening, but it falls apart even with the slightest bit of scrutiny.

Our wounds make us who we are, but being damaged doesn't always make us stronger - in the case of Irene Villamor's On Vodka, Beers and Regrets, the damage we incur over our lives may even threaten to destroy us completely, and not even love can save it.

The film continues what Villamor started with last year's Ulan - a story of self-realization blanketed in a love story. Jane (Bela Padilla) is an actress who has gone through a lot - aside from a number of scandals and a tumultuous childhood, she's developed an addiction to alcohol. She constantly seeks affection from others, perhaps best seen in her tendency to "acquire" cats as pets, since society as a whole isn't helping her situation. When she meets Francis (JC Santos), she finds a source of comfort for the first time, but bad habits are hard to break.

The film immediately reminded me of the recently concluded Bojack Horseman, where it's not enough to stop blaming one's circumstance and admit fault for all the times people have fucked up their lives, to heal, to truly heal requires a process that takes constant, determined effort. It also lays waste to the notion that love is an all powerful panacea for any kind of personal pain. If there's anything in the film that constitutes a shortcoming for me, it's that I wish the film would have concentrated on this healing process a bit more, because as it is, the conclusion wraps things up a little too quickly and cleanly.

That said, the film is genuinely entertaining and a counter to all the hugot stuff we've been getting recently. However one approaches it - as a romance, an indictment of showbusiness or as a treatise on addiction and brokenness - there's something in this film to love. 

Present Confusion 2019 Rundown Part 3 - World Cinema and One More Final

Hopefully I can change this next year

It's time to end our little three parter, as a last farewell to the year that was and as greetings for the year ahead. A little belated, but out of roughly 350 films seen, here are 14 favorites from world cinema that I saw last year. Rules are: 1) can be released anytime 2018-2019 as long as I saw it in 2019, 2) favorites, not necessarily best and 3) doesn't matter where and how I saw it, a movie is a movie is a movie.

So, in rough order:

John Tawasil's

WORLD CINEMA FAVORITES 2019

14. We Are Little Zombies (Makoto Nagahisa, 2019)

Bathed in chiptune, punk rock and eclectic visual styles, Makoto Nagahisa's debut film is also a movie about the different ways we process grief. While prone to succumbing to its own flair, it is nevertheless a genuine treat to watch.

13. Knives Out (Rian Johnson, 2019)

Out of all the films in this list, this is the film that arguably has the most fun with its premise. Patterned after an oldschool whodunit, Knives Out then turns all that on its head and uses the medium to tell an interesting story about class, neoliberalism and American society.

12. Hello World (Tomohiko Ito, 2019)

Hello World is a science fiction-flavored high school romance anime, but what sets it apart from other anime works that came out this year is its interesting matryoshka doll-like structure, worldbuilding and manipulation of reality.

11. Woman at War (Benedikt Erlingsson, 2018) 

Woman as mother, woman as mother-earth, woman as Artemis, goddess of the wilderness. Benedikt Erlingsson's Woman at War shows Halla (Halldóra Geirharðsdóttir) at odds with her own nature: the duality of her wants and needs with her desire to change the world.

10. Manta Ray (Phuttiphong Aroonpheng, 2018)

Manta Ray is a tribute to refugees all around the world; it is a story about a refugee without nation or identity, trying to gain the nation and identity of others and failing. It does not let itself get shackled into conventional cinematic forms, as it trudges without fear into strangeness, taking us along for the ride.

9. A Girl Missing (Koji Fukada, 2019)

Koji Fukada continues his cinematic exploration of Japanese society in A Girl Missing, where once again the inclusion of an intrusive force bends and stretches the notion of societal graces to its absolute limit. While not his best film, it still deserves a spot on this list.

8. Bacurau (Kleber Mendonça Filho & Juliano Dornelles, 2019)

A western wrapped in blood-soaked psychedelia, Bacurau defies convenient explanation, though the themes of community resistance to colonialism and neocolonialism in the era of populist leaders like Bolsonaro makes this a very timely film for many nations around the world.

7. The Lighthouse (Robert Eggers, 2019)

Perhaps the most disturbing adaptation of Perfect Strangers ever made (I kid, and points to whoever got the reference), Eggers' reimagination of the Promethean myth is surreal and captivating in so many different ways.

6. Kim Ji-young, Born 1982 (Kim Do-young, 2019)

This at times devastating portrait of a woman worn down by society and the expectations forced upon her gender is not an easy watch. It shows the little things that wear women (and also men) down in a deeply patriarchal society, and how these traumas are passed down through generations. It's a call for empathy and shared responsibility in work and child care in a society that is slowly moving towards true equality for men and women. 

5. Suburban Birds (Sheng Qiu, 2019)

Sheng Qiu's mesmerizing feature debut is in my opinion the best competition film of QCinema 2019, a slow-paced, haunting treatise on the malleable landscapes of memory and physical urban spaces.

4. I Am Easy to Find (Mike Mills, 2019)

My favorite American film of 2019 is not a "cinema film;", it 's free to watch on Youtube. Yet in the space of roughly 25 minutes, it exceeds most of my experiences in the cinema this year, proving (at least to me) that a movie doesn't have to be in the theater to count. It features The National, a rock band perhaps best described as "sad white dads pining about love", yet in this film (and the album of the same name) there is a curious inclusion of female voices, and it's easy to see why. 

Frontman Mike Berninger talks of the album's final track, and the film's signature song, Light Years, as a song "about just feeling distant from somebody on a different orbit – people who love each other but don’t understand each other." I Am Easy to Find is a movie and album about empathy, or at least an attempt at understanding the women closest to us, whether they be mothers, sisters or wives. In the film, a woman's entire life is shown in bits and pieces, eventually forming a picture of a complete, separate human being, full of wants, needs, hopes and dreams.

3. Portrait of a Lady on Fire (Celine Sciamma, 2019)

In this film, in a society and time where women are all but invisible, there are women who see, women who look, and women who are seen. As a romance, this is also a film about keeping the idea of love alive, through memory or works of art, with the latter meant to last forever.

2. Parasite (Bong Joon-ho, 2019)

A truly marvelous work of cinema, one that will be remembered for years to come, Parasite is Bong at what is perhaps the peak of his creative powers: a film about class divides and Korean society that is incisive, profound, thrilling and even darkly funny at times.

1. Liz and the Bluebird (Naoko Yamada, 2018)

"I wanted this movie to be like two girls dancing. The flutter of an eye, an intake of breath, hair swaying like a pendulum. Everything girls are made of, becoming music." - Naoko Yamada 

A startlingly beautiful work, from its minimalist soundtrack to its Bressonian framing to the soft and delicate designwork of the late Futoshi Nishiya, my jaw dropped in awe and tears fell freely while watching this film. There's so much packed into every furtive glance, every gesture, every second of silence, multitudes seemingly borne from nothing.

It is a masterful deconstruction of the moe genre its animation company is best known for, an experimental reimagining of Sound Euphonium, and Yamada's best work yet. But with every viewing of this film from now on, there is another level of undescribable sadness: given what happened to Kyoto Animation in the past year, a film like Liz and the Bluebird may never come again.

***

Disclaimer: I am a lot fatter than this avatar lol

And now, one last thing as we go into the new year. Present Confusion has been in existence for almost 15 years, and I've enjoyed sharing my film experiences with everybody thus far. But in the past few years, my output and turnaround has slowed down, partly due to real life stuff and the reality of aging. It's time I acknowledged what I've known for a long time: the blog is long past its prime.

That's why I won't be posting reviews as much as I used to, and I won't actively seek out every local film that comes out from now on. It's good to support the industry by watching everything, but with it comes the fact that by watching really bad films, I'm enabling them financially. I'll still be covering and reviewing whatever film festival or event comes my way, but as for the other films, I might resort to shorter capsule reviews or just focusing on certain films instead. Hopefully through this I can focus on more international films in the future.

Eventually of course, the blog will wind down and my journey through film with you all will end. Not this year, I hope, but definitely someday. I'll be sure to let you all know when I've truly thrown in the towel.

Present Confusion heads to its twilight years confident that other, younger talent will take over and cover the slew of Filipino films that come out every year in cinemas. You can find some of them in the list to my right (desktop version), and I'll be adding a lot more sites to that sidebar in the coming months.

So for 2020, I'll see you all at the movies!

Present Confusion 2019 Rundown Part 2 - Philippine Cinema Odds, Ends and Unfavorites

xi30_frenching_ASMR.mp3

It's hard to distill the entirety of Filipino Cinema in just 15 films. There are so many other great performances and other cinema-related things that defined the year, and I'd like to share some of that here with you in the second part of this three part series.

First off, here are five films that almost made the top 15, all very good films in their own right. Here are

John Tawasil's

HONORABLE MENTIONS 2019

hindi po ito worst, best pa rin ito, baka lang maconfuse kayo

HM#1: Alone/Together (dir. Antoinette Jadaone)

Alone/Together is two dueling films in one: as a romantic movie, Alone/Together is just ok. But as a movie about a woman finding herself and achieving her full potential, I think this film is best of year material (not just favorite, but best of year.)

HM#2: Lola Igna (dir. Eduardo Roy, Jr.)

Another little gem from the PPP, Lola Igna is a tender examination of celebrity culture and old age, lifted by an amazing performance by Angie Ferro - one of the year's best performances, in fact.

HM#3: Open (dir. Andoy Ranay)

The best Andoy Ranay film is Open, a relationship drama about the breakup of two people who probably should have broken up waaaaay back. Open's not really about the openness of a relationship with a partner, but about openness of a future without them.

HM#4: Akin ang Korona (dir. Zig Dulay)

Imagine being on a film festival about social realism and making a film deconstructing and criticizing the manufacture of social realism. That takes balls.

HM#5: Metamorphosis (dir. JE Tiglao)

Though at times more melodramatic and on the nose than I personally prefer, Metamorphosis talks about something unique and in need of a voice, which I can appreciate.

So that's basically #16-20 if you prefer. Now we segue to:

John Tawasil's 

Special Citations for Philippine Film 2019

Favorite Local Film Festival - QCinema 2019/Cinema One Originals 2019 (tie)

Great lineups, more venues, better experiences. And this year they don't happen immediately after the other!

Most Horrible Film Fest-related Tragedy - loss of Gardenia over at Cinemalaya 2019

I cried when Cinemalaya downsized their food options. I was a sadboi for about 2 minutes, because I make my own damn rules, I brought my own loaf of Gardenia to Cinemalaya, bitches

I AM INEVITABLE

Most Wasted Opportunity of a Time Travel Plot - Time & Again (2019)

The most irritating part of these time travel stories is WHY DON'T THESE PEOPLE KNOW TEMPORAL  CAUSALITY. Avengers Endgame came out THIS YEAR. There is absolutely no excuse.

Most Dance Movie Thing Ever Said - Indak

And I paraphrase, "Let's show them our feelings through dance!"

Most Impressive Collection of Luxury Cars in a Local Movie - Mission Unstapabol

Seriously, this is approaching Fast and the Furious Levels. These are some impressive (and expensive!) cars. One wonders where they came from.

Saddest Disappointment of 2019 - An1: The Harvest, O

The first had wonderful worldbuilding that was ruined by an awkward edit. The second had probably the best intro of 2019 (using IV of Spades' I am a Butterfly) but was basically an incomplete film.

Favorite Movie Moments of 2019:

1) The Christmas Lights Scene (Isa Pa, With Feelings)

2) Kathang Isip (LSS)

3) Asin (Babae at Baril)

4) One Take Party scene (Tayo, sa Huling Buwan ng Taon)

Most eeeeevil villain of 2019 Philippine Cinema that is not "Cinema Operators" - JC Santos as Ethan in Open

This dude legit freaked me out. Hide your mothers, hide your sisters etc etc.

Best Horror Film - Sunod

This year isn't exactly the best in Philippine horror, but there are a few decent ones. Probably one of MMFF 2019's best entries is a horror film with an atmosphere that is unmatched among similar films this year. and great turns by Carmina Villaruel, Kate Alejandrino and Krystal Brimner. (honorable mention for Horror film has to go to Clarita, which is decent in and of itself.)

Movie Star for All Seasons - Dante Gulapa

because why not. Thanks to his amazing skill, the man has appeared in two movies this year. 

Weirdest Use of a Song in a Historical Film - Damaso

Imagine the tense meeting scenes in Heneral Luna, but instead of a tense meeting everyone's doing jazz hands and singing like it's a counterfeit Ryan Cayabyab musical.

Most Explosive Scene 2019 - I'm Ellenya L.

You know the one.

And you know I'm right. lol

Most tense moment of 2019 that worked out really well - Finding out which would be Eddie Garcia's last film after he died

For a long time it was Sanggago. Thank Cthulhu it ended up being Kalel, 15.

Prolific Director Award 2019 - Joven Tan, Jason Paul Laxamana

IIRC, Both released 4 movies this year each.

Favorite New Cinema - Ayala Malls Manila Bay

The mall itself is still a work in progress, but watching C1 Originals Films in these brand new cinemas were a 2019 highlight.

Stupidest Movie of 2019 But In A Good Way - Mystified

Mystified reunites the cast of the original Encantadia in a streaming only special effects laden extravaganza that I can only call one of the stupidest things I have ever seen, in a good way. The plot is about an exiled band of magic users trying to revive the Dark Lord Luvictus, who I can best describe as an "Arabic Chippendales Wizard."

AREOLAS THE SIZE OF HUBCAPS

Jinri Park is in this film, looking for host bodies for another evil witch. The host body, she says, is VERY Sexy, as if it were a vaunted criterion. In a hospital room (not a ward) there is the sound of a respirator, even though there is no respirator in the room.  One character unironically exclaims "Bye Felicia!" as they hurtle down to the ground. This film is the gift that keeps on giving.

***

You can't talk about the best without talking about the opposite of best, and you can't talk about favorites without talking about Unfavorites. Yes, that is a word, I claim it in the name of the Empire of Man, all hail the Emperor of Mankind. This year was home to a lot of mediocre films, but not a lot of truly vomit-inducing films. I honestly feel a little worse for the former than the latter. Say a little prayer for the mediocre films, the Pansamantagals and the Papa Pogis that will disappear from memory over time. That isn't to say I didn't enjoy some of these films, but watching bad films is hard, yo.

The Portrait of a Film Reviewer as a Filipino v3 (Tawasil, 2019)

John Tawasil's

Unfavorite Local Films of 2019

yes, these are the not so good films

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Trigonal Honorable Mention Award Certificate: Exit Point (dir. Ronnie Ricketts)

This certifiably insane film about prison cannibals, rock sock nunchucks and Where's Waldo falls into the "it's so bad, it's good" category. It ends on a cliffhanger, and since Ronnie Ricketts may be going to real prison we may not see a sequel? I'm just waiting for him to escape and join some real life cannibals and make the sequel with them as co-stars. Authenticity!

9-10. Hanggang Kailan?/My Bakit List (dir. Bona Fajardo)

Okay, these are not really that bad; they're at the very least decent tourism videos. But the romance that surrounds these thinly veiled tourism videos are really not that great, both involving toxic men. The former is a film about a girl conflicted about splitting with a confirmed cheater, the second is a film about a girl conflicted about letting go of a confirmed chea... wait a minute

8. Boy Tokwa: Lodi ng Gapo (dir. Tony Y. Reyes)

This weird, unfunny, badly shot garbage was produced by senator Tito Sotto. If this is any indication of the quality of the films we're gonna get from him (in, say, future MMFFs,) we'll be taking cues from another Philippine senator:

well, have you?

***

7. Kiko en Lala (dir. Adolf Alix, Jr.)

THIS WAS THE GUY WHO DIRECTED ISDA. And now, he's involved with making this completely uninspired film, which is probably also unfinished given the state of the special effects, which looked like they were done on my neighbor's Pentium 266 from FREAKING 1998.

6. Familia Blondina (dir. Jerry Sineneng)

Hey guys, wanna make a movie in a weekend? Let's just get a couple of wigs from the bodega, smear some shit on a script and we're all set. This is the textbook definition of a film that doesn't even try. This wouldn't even get a "You Tried" star in kindergarten. It would get something like this instead:

this makes mommy want to take little bobby back to the hospital

***

5. The Last Interview: The Mayor Antonio Halili Story (dir. Ceasar Soriano)

Aside from its artistic decision to ACTUALLY INCLUDE THE REAL DEATH FOOTAGE OF ANTONIO HALILI, a decision that I find disrespectful to the person involved, this film inserts its own director, Unfavorite film list hall of famer Ceasar Soriano, as a self-insert. Perhaps he wanted to be a heroic journalist like the guys from Spotlight, but he ended up being a Boyoyong clown made of pinewood instead.

4. Bato: The Gen. Ronald Dela Rosa Story (dir. Adolf Alix, Jr.)

Biopics sometimes lionize great men, though to at least have a bit of success in that regard the man has to have a little lion in him in the first place. But how do you lionize a jackal? I don't know what financial difficulties Alix had this year, but he must've really needed the money. A shameless (potentially illegal) political ad shown months before a major election, Bato is lifeless, mirthless, craftless and silly, especially since Jelson Bay is a much better fit for Bato and you know it.

3. Love; Life (dir. Nikko Arcega)

Love; Life isn't actually a bad film, if you read it as a film about a deranged psychopath taking an unwitting girl into his psychotic fantasy, believing that she is the reincarnation of his ex-fiancee. But if you read it as a romantic film, Love; Life seems like it was written by a rudimentary A.I. that writes romantic scripts but was ruined thanks to a 4chan raid. Or maybe this should have been called To My Alien Friend instead of that documentary, because this could potentially be evidence that extraterrestrials are trying (and failing) to find out how human relationships work.

2. 3Pol Trobol Huli Ka Balbon (dir. Coco Martin)

Proponents of the MMFF say that the reason why experiments like the 2016 edition of the fest "didn't work" was because audiences want films for the entire family, and ESPECIALLY films for kids. 3Pol Trobol is not a film for kids. I'd say it's not a film for adults either. In fact, it's not a film for human consumption; it is perhaps best shown by sadists to cattle or pigs in slaughterhouses to remind them of the cruel inevitability of death. It has three (3) attempted rapes, and the punishment (handed out by Isko Moreno, no less, which isn't a good look for the good mayor)? A slap on the wrist. It's neanderthal times again, folks. The film is full of offensive messages: 1) drag is funny and is just straight people dressing up to cop a feel (haha was that a pun) 2) Women cross dressing is weird, and proves that they shouldn't be working in male spaces and 3) almost raping someone gets you a slap on the wrist. haha but what do Filipinos care they want fAmIlY EnTeRtAiNmEnT ¯\_(ツ)_/¯

1. KontrAdiksyon (dir. Njel de Mesa)

This film is every shitty Facebook post shared by your friend or family member that you probably should have blocked a long time ago, but you don't because you don't want an echo chamber or just  don't want to for the lulz. Mix that with a bunch of turds, some leaps in logic and Zombies (!) and you get a film so terrible, it made me wonder if you can retract a Palanca award for shittiness.

Okay, I guess that's about it?

Haha just kidding

SPECIAL RAGE-INDUCED DISHONORABLE MENTION

0. The second half of Pandanggo sa Hukay (dir. Sheryl Andes)

No cinematic moment has made my blood pressure shoot up like the second half of Cinemalaya 2019's Pandanggo sa Hukay. To be fair, the first half of the film is good, great even. But it then devolves into a horrible tonally deaf shitshow, as if someone took the second half of the script and urinated on it. It's arty and edgy in all the wrong ways, and deserves this star:

***

It's time to end this three parter with a handful of excellent films from the world stage and a special announcement about the future of this blog.