November 12, 2025
Baby Facundo (Maricel Soriano) had three adult sons. The eldest was Christopher or Tupe (Piolo Pascual), who had a restaurant in Los Angeles. The second was Brad (Joshua Garcia), a nursing graduate now running their lechon business. The third was Leo (Juan Karlos), a musician now living in with his girlfriend Jen (Kaori Oinuma) and 3 year-old son Charlie. Tupe had a college-graduate daughter Geri Anne (Belle Mariano), who grew up with Baby.
One day, the family found out that despite previous surgery and chemo, Baby's breast cancer has come back with spread to the brain and liver. The doctor proposed to do chemo again, but Baby refused. Instead she bargained that she would only undergo chemo if she could somehow score VIP tickets to attend the Meet-and-Greet event of her favorite Korean actor Park Seo-joon. Her children disagreed on how to proceed with this dilemma.
Aside from the returning cancer of Baby, another main conflict of the film was the arrival of Tupe from the US which was met with different reactions from his siblings. Leo idolized him no end, so he welcomed him heartily. However, Brad and Geri seemed to have deep resentment against him, as they gave him the cold shoulder. When Tupe agreed to get tickets for Baby, Brad went against his brother and sought alternative herbal therapies for her.
Portrayed as only Maricel Soriano can, her Baby was bravely putting up a happy front to hide her anxiety. Soriano gave Baby that maternal warmth that made all of us watching feel like she was our mother. Joshua Garcia and Belle Mariano had internalized the hurt that Brad and Geri had been harboring within themselves over the years. Juan Karlos gave Leo that sweet cheerful personality which served well to diffuse brewing tensions in their house.
And then there was Piolo Pascual as Tupe. Even on paper, him being cast as Maricel Soriano's eldest son felt like a stretch, especially since Pascual was only 12 years younger than Soriano, and over 20 years older than Joshua Garcia in real life. On the big screen, he really looked and felt out of place, but Pascual was giving it his best effort. It was his final monologue during the family confrontation scene that tied the whole story together.
Comedic moments are provided by Matet de Leon and Jeffrey Tam (as househelp Jona and Kerwin), Madeline Nicolas and Marnie Lapus (as Baby's BFFs). That scene in Baby's poster filled room explained how Tupe, Brad, Leo and Geri got their names was quite funny. A luminous Kaila Estrada had a short appearance playing Brad's ex-girlfriend Angie visiting from New Zealand. Robbie Jaworski was introduced playing Geri's shy workmate.
This latest film by box-office hit director Cathy Garcia-Sampana was a typical Pinoy melodrama about troubled family dynamics and terminal disease, which she co-wrote with Jumbo Albano and Patrick Valencia. To balance out the drama, she also tackled the crazy efforts of diehard fans buying tickets for K-drama idol events, from the intense online queueing, to wily scammers, and overnight camping outside the venue. 6/10
No comments:
Post a Comment