March 6, 2024
Because he had to take a three-month leave owing to a fractured arm, Charles (TJ Valderrama) requested his bosses at ForeVR -- Ligaya (Andrea del Rosario), Frida (Marion Aunor) and Trini (Marnie Lapus) -- to hire his sister's best friend Dante (Jerome Ponce) to cover for him at work. Despite his Social Anxiety Disorder, Dante proved to be very good at his job as a Mumu -- a motion-capture artist portraying the virtual men of ForeVR.
ForeVR offered their female clientele four different male stereotypes to tickle their fantasies -- the bad boy Zach (PJ Rosario), the fancy guy Misha (Keann Johnson), the workman Luis (Massimo Scofield), and the gigolo Kenji (Thor Gomez). One day, Glenda (Jasmin Curtis-Smith) walked into ForeVR asking one of their former choices which was now put on hold, the boy next door Kokoy (Diego Loyzaga). Dante was assigned to be the Mumu to voice him.
A central aspect of this film was Dante's Social Anxiety Disorder, and the success of this film depended on the accuracy of how this disorder was portrayed. Dante Dimla had always been afraid that everyone was judging him, causing extreme anxiety. However, can simply wearing a surgical mask really help him to face others? How can he be so confident in portraying men of the world when he did not have any personal experience of these interactions with women? Is the effect of Propranolol shown onscreen for this anxiety disorder realistic?
Writer-director Jason Paul Laxamana had tackled a sci-fi theme before in "Instalado" (2017), about education via direct uploading of information in people's brains. This one does have a futuristic vibe to it given the high-tech gadgetry, but this one seems more doable, if not already existent in some form somewhere around the world. He showed here how people with serious mental health issues tend to use technology to cope with their perceived shortcomings.
Curtis-Smith's Glenda was frustrated because she was losing connection with the man she loved. The real person behind Loyzaga's Kokoy was so obsessed with showering his lady love with riches, he didn't realize he was pushing her away. Dante gave Jerome Ponce a showcase for his versatility, and he gave it his A-game without melodramatic excess. He had to shift roles among the five ForeVR avatars, as well as Dante's own demons given his debilitating psychiatric disorder, plus the massive guilt feelings weighing him further down. 6/10.
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