September 18, 2012
I have known about this movie when it was one of the featured films in the recent Cinemalaya Film Fest. However aside from the terrible title, the synopsis describing a film an elderly gay man with his dog was so bleak, it did not interest me at all. Maybe because it won Eddie Garcia a Best Actor award, it was given a commercial run which was good, but I still did not have a plan to watch it. Well, that is until this morning when I found out that this film will be our country's entry to the Oscars Foreign Language Film category for this year. Honestly, that was the only reason why I felt I should give it a chance after all.
Unfortunately, this film turned out to be as bleak and as dry as its synopsis suggested. It was indeed about an elderly gay man named Rene (Eddie Garcia) and his dog Bwakaw (played by an "aspin"/"askal" named Princess). The drama played for an hour and a half or maybe more, as slow, as straightforward and as predictable as that.
There were of course some people in his neighborhood he interacted with, like his nosy next-door neighbor Nitang (Beverly Salviejo), the gays at the beauty salon (Soxie Topacio and Joey Paras), his co-workers in the Post Office (Luz Valdez and Allan Paule), the priest who was always seen fanning himself (Gardo Versoza) and the tricycle driver the old curmudgeon decided to befriend (Rez Cortez). The elegant Ms. Armida Siguion-Reyna stood out in her featured role as Alicia, the girlfriend Rene kept hanging for 15 years, only not to marry. I see the name of Bibeth Orteza in the cast list, but I honestly do not remember seeing her in the film.
OK, there were some scenes that made me laugh. There was even a scene that made me tear up. There was a scene that I felt certain was bound to happen, it did, but I wish it did not. However, the main fault of this film is that there were no big surprises at all. There were no hidden symbolism or deeper meanings. It did not challenge me think at all. I felt I have seen this same story of growing old lonely told many times before in many a made-for-TV drama show. "Bwakaw" is not really that bad, but is this it? Is this really the BEST we have to show the world this year to compete for the Oscars?
September 6, 2012
This is the very first film by Cannes-winning Filipino director Brillante Mendoza that I saw in a movie theater. At the outset, I am going to confess that I do not think I can judge this film very objectively. Watching this film with all its unsteady camera work made me very dizzy starting from the 40th minute. From that point, I could not even look directly at the screen anymore. The shaky camera was relentless, be it a frenetic battle scene or a quiet personal one. It certainly did not help that this was a 2-hour long film. My head is still reeling as I write this review, four hours after the end credits rolled! This is only the second time a movie made me feel sick, the first one being "The Blair Witch Project."
The movie was based on the 2001 Abu Sayyaf kidnapping of tourists from the Dos Palmas Resort in the province of Palawan. Two of the kidnap victims then were Martin and Gracia Burnham. Gracia survived her ordeal and wrote a book about her harrowing experiences entitled "In The Presence of My Enemies." I thought that acclaimed French actress Isabelle Huppert will be playing her, but it turned out that Ms. Huppert's central character of social worker Therese is fictional. Another Caucasian couple played minor characters who seemed to be based on the Burnhams.
After the abduction scenes in the beginning and four long days of sea travel, the film became what seemed to be an endless series of hiking through the jungles of Basilan, commandeering civilian places like a hospital or school, getting attacked by the Armed Forces, forcing a ceasefire by asking a victim to appeal, and moving on to the next destination, where the cycle began again. It became very repetitious. In between, there would be interludes showing facets of Moslem culture or nature metaphors featuring wild animals. I felt like I already knew this story from news reports. I was looking for a more in-depth exploratory story from the side of the Islamic captors, but I don't think I saw that here.
Since I could not look at the screen the whole time because of my dizziness and nausea, I got confused what happened to various characters due to the episodic nature of the storytelling. How did the role of rebel leader played by Raymond Bagatsing become another one played by Sid Lucero? What was the point of having Coco Martin in a cameo? His look did not really fit into the film. I felt that was a little indulgent on the part of Mendoza.
I fully appreciate the dedicated efforts of cast and crew in filming in such obviously difficult conditions. However, the final product felt unwieldy and overstuffed. It seemed like they did not want any shot to end up on the cutting floor. The subject matter is heavy enough, the senses need not have been assaulted any much more by the excessively shaky camera and the very loud explosions! I know Mendoza was most likely going for added realism for us to immerse into the hostage experience, but I feel these vertiginous visual and sound effects should have been reigned in in kinder consideration to the comfort of the viewing audience.
August 30, 2012
"I Do Bidoo Bidoo" (by writer-director Chris Martinez) does not deny that it was inspired by the success of "Mamma Mia". However, instead of ABBA songs, this local counterpart uses the similarly diverse discography of the APO Hiking Society, a collection of Filipino pop classics accumulated for more than 30 years since they started to record in the early 1970s.
This is a story about two families. The Polotan family is lower middle class, while the Fuentebella family is super rich. Rock Polotan (Sam Concepcion) falls in love with Tracy Fuentebella (Tippy dos Santos), leading to an unexpected teenage pregnancy. Rock's parents are Pol (Ogie Alcasid), a one-hit wonder songwriter who gives guitar lessons to kids in the neighborhood, and Rosie (Eugene Domingo), a caterer to funerals. Tracy's parents are Nick (Gary Valenciano), a career-centered businessman, and Elaine (Zsazsa Padilla), a lonely neglected housewife. The obviously radical class difference of course led to a very disastrous "pamamanhikan." This consequently led to all the characters rethinking about their own situations with their respective partners in love. Will love prevail in the end?
All the actors come up with very energetic performances. They all did their own singing of course, even Eugene Domingo (who was very brave here, in more ways than just her singing). Gary V. and Zsazsa were as coldly aristocratic as Ogie and Eugene were noisily "jologs." As the young lovers, Sam Concepcion and the ingenue Tippy dos Santos have a good chemistry in their scenes and duets together. Special mention go to scene-stealing supporting characters, namely Jimmy Fabregas as the war-freak ex-soldier Villafuerte grandfather and Neil Coleta as the Rock's conflicted best friend. Frenchie Dy and Sweet Plantado (of the Company) also turn in some pretty funny moments as Eugene's best friends.
This love story was told in the words of APO Hiking Society's biggest hit songs. As corny and cheesy as that idea sounds, it actually works and was a lot of fun! (**** I will be mentioning song titles after this, so if you want to be surprised as to which songs will be included, you may want to refer back to this review after you have seen the film.)
There were some scenes may remind you of other musical films. The "Awit ng Barkada" scene with Eugene, Frenchie and Sweet was straight out reminiscent of the "Chiquitita" number from "Mamma Mia." The choreography of the "Syotang Pa-Class" scene was adapted from the "Get'cha Head in the Game" basketball dance number from "High School Musical." That said though, I thought the use of these songs for those topics in the story was so smart and very appropriate.
You can sometimes predict what song is coming up because of the words and situation that lead into the song. We get the song "Panalangin" when the characters were praying in a chapel. The song "Ewan" came right after a character says that very word. "Salawikain" came when the characters were having a "salawikain" argument over lunch. But again, predictable does not mean that these were bad ideas. The execution of these scenes were very well done.
Of course, those beautiful APO love songs were really put to very good use. There were those in perfect position, like the emotionally bitter "Tuyo ng Damdamin," the devastatingly tragic "Nakapagtataka" and the romantically pleading "Paano." There were those in the most hilariously unexpected contexts, like "Mahirap Magmahal," "Kaibigan," and most especially the scandalously Rated-R naughty interpretation of "Di Na Natuto" (which I honestly did not know was an APO song first before Gary V. hit big with it).
The sensitive topic of teen pregnancy as well as some raunchy scenes and dialogs makes this film for strong parental guidance, and not for very young kids. I was hoping they could have avoided these touchy themes and made a truly general patronage film for the whole family to enjoy. Otherwise, this film is very entertaining indeed most especially for people who love APO Hiking Society music, and that should be a big chunk of the Filipino adult population out there who grew up in the 1970s to the 1990s. It was fun to see how these beloved songs were used in the story and it was also fun to actually sing along to those all-familiar lyrics. I think you will enjoy this movie as I did, corn and cheese included! Congratulations to director Chris Martinez for another winner!
August 29, 2012
This movie was made for the Cinemalaya Film Festival 2012, is considered an indie film, despite its star director, Jose Javier Reyes, and all-star cast composed of Judy Ann Santos, Iza Calzado, Janice de Belen and Agot Isidro. The remarkable thing about this movie is that its ensemble cast was given an unprecedented accolade as Best Actress AND Supporting Actress during the Cinemalaya awards! Admittedly, this award was what made me want to watch this film.
"Mga Mumunting Lihim" is about "Those Little Secrets" we keep from even our closest friends. From the start we already see the wake of Mariel (Judy Ann Santos) who just died from pancreatic cancer. This was attended by her closest friends successful advertising executive Carly (Iza Calzado), social-climbing socialite Sandy (Agot Isidro) and desperate housewife Olivia (Janice de Belen).
Problems begin to arise when Carly receives a box of diaries which "Mga Mumunting Lihim" is about "Those Little Secrets" we keep from even our closest friends specifically bequeathed to her. In this meticulous journals, Mariel recounted her thoughts about pleasant and unpleasant events that happened to her and her friends. Her three friends never expected what their friend had to say about them, and what they once said about each other. Can they ever get their close friendship back after they allowed the contents of Mariel's diaries to break them up?
I fully understand now why the Best Actress/Supporting Actress awards were given that way. All four of these actress acted as a perfect ensemble with each other. Although we can feel that Judy Ann and Iza had more central roles, the more peripheral roles of Agot and Janice all had their own turns to shine. I guess the reason why they had to make this film independently is because of its very serious and morose storyline. No all-star cast can make this story like this a commercial success that a mainstream producer wants. But I guess it also because of this famous cast that caused this film to be the first to be chosen for a commercial run from among the Cinemalaya films this year.
The direction and storytelling of Joey Reyes tend to be melodramatic. The four actresses can really turn on their waterworks to make the audience do the same. There were also some funny (albeit unrealistic) confrontation scenes where the girls turn on their bitchy modes. I was just distracted a bit by continuity problems by which diary Carly was reading with the sequence of events. I also do not really know why Reyes reused complete scenes at different parts of the film with unclear intention. There seemed to be no dramatic purpose for replaying these scenes at all.
I thought this film could have been more effective as a short film than a full length film like this. At almost two hours in length, the sad basic story simply got pulled out too long. However, its stellar cast still makes this film worth your time. They are really the best part of this film, and despite the unusual presentation, their awards are most well- deserved, and reason enough to check this indie film out.
August 21, 2012
Philip K. Dick (1928-1982) was an American writer who rose to prominence in the 1960s with his body of work which dealt with alternate historical fiction, melding this with science fiction. He had 44 published novels, including the award-winning "The Man in the High Castle." He also wrote about 120 short stories, several of which had been adapted into famous big budget movies, like "Blade Runner," "Minority Report," "The Adjustment Bureau," "A Scanner Darkly" and "Total Recall." It was unfortunate that he was not able to gain financially from his written work in spite of their renown.
In April 1966, Dick wrote a short story entitled "We Can Remember it for You Wholesale," which was first published in the The Magazine for Fantasy and Science Fiction. The story is about Douglas Quail, an ordinary guy who constantly dreamed of going to Mars, but was financially unable to. So he decided the next best thing was to go to REKAL, a memory-implanting service, to get his fill of Mars experiences, as a secret Interplan agent to boot. However, the staff at Rekal discover that these Martian memories already existed in Quail's brain! After the procedure, Quail is pursued by Interplan agents to be killed as he now recalls a secret mission he did for that agency. Quail bargains for his life by suggesting that those Mars memories be replaced by a more incredible memory of him preventing an alien take-over of Earth when he was only 9 years old. However during the procedure, Rekal were in for another big surprise.
In 1990, a big sci-fi blockbuster film came out entitled "Total Recall" starring the biggest action star of that time, Arnold Schwarzenegger, with one of the more controversial directors, Paul Verhoeven. In the hands of Verhoeven, "We Can Remember it for You Wholesale" was imaginatively transformed into a very complex inter-planetary screenplay. Arnold played a construction worker named Douglas Quaid (not the original name Quail), blissfully married to beautiful Lori (Sharon Stone). Bothered by dreams of Mars, he goes to Rekall, Inc., an establishment where they sell memories, so he can take a virtual trip to the Red Planet. After a snafu during the memory implantation procedure, Quaid suddenly becomes the "shoot-to-kill" target of government agents who seem to believe that he is Hauser, a secret agent working for the Martian resistance. So what is real and what is not? We the audience were taken for an exciting trip, that was as much an action as well as a mind game. Now that was one interesting, eye-popping and entertaining sci-fi film.
Fast forward to 2012, "Total Recall" gets remade. Colin Farrell takes on Schwarzenegger's Douglas Quaid/Hauser role. The sexy and sleek Kate Beckinsale becomes a Lori Quaid that meshed the characters of BOTH Sharon Stone and Michael Ironside (Quaid's relentless pursuer) in the first film. Jessica Biel completes the triangle, as Melina, the girl in Quaid's "previous" life (played by Rachel Ticotin in the first movie).
Honestly, this remake felt more like a Kate Beckinsale movie. If this is because the director Len Wiseman is her husband, I do not know. But to be fair though, Kate really excels in these action roles, as she did in her "Underworld" films, very believable that she can really kick serious ass. In contrast, Colin Farrell and Jessica Biel had very wan, even forgettable, screen presence here. I did not really care about them at all, which was ironic since they were supposed to be the heroes. For all the flack that Arnold Schwarzenegger got about being a lousy actor, Arnie's undeniable larger-than-life big screen charisma and unintended tongue-in-cheek sense of humor was really missed in this pale and leaden remake.
I do not know if it is because we already know how the basic story would go, but there was not really much improvement to be seen in this redux. Of course, the computer-generated special effects were expected to exceed the original, which still had obviously fake blood and creature effects with actual puppets. The first "Total Recall" had the distinction of being one of the last major Hollywood film to use large-scale use of miniature effects, and one of the first to use computer-generated imagery. However, it is really unfortunate that the director concentrated too much on making this remake merely an overly-computerized, generic-looking action movie.
The basic mental conundrum of Quaid's real existence ("Is it Real, or is it Recall?"), which made the first film interesting, is lost in all of these computer-generated slam-bang action sequences. It seemed only a vague backgrounder or a mere afterthought. For some odd reason, the current makers even decided to take the whole Mars scenario out of the remake! The conflict in this remake centered around a "United Federation of Britain" and "The Colony." The very heart of the first movie about the mutants and the precious commodity of air were not here. Therefore essentially this remake just becomes another one of those un-memorable soul-less futuristic chase movies, like we have seen so many many times before.
August 14, 2012
The original "Ring" film is a horror movie classic. Its central character is Sadako, a girl in a white dress with very long black hair who climbed out of a well and into the living rooms of her victims through the TV. The creepy way Sadako's disheveled tresses covered her face and the jerky way she would creep and walk were copied shamelessly in several other Asian horror flicks, even several years afterwards.
When I first saw the ads of this film, it was pretty exciting. This movie promised to bring Sadako in all her 3D glory, and I could not wait to see her crawl right through the silver screen right at us. However, when I got to the theater earlier, it turned out that locally (it is an SM Cinema Exclusive), it would only be shown in Digital 2D. In fact, it had been re-titled "The Ring 3." Groan.
Anyway, "The Ring 3" is about Akane, a young teacher in a Catholic girls school. One of her students gets obsessed in searching the internet for a certain "cursed suicide video" which rumors say allegedly showed someone committing suicide, and resulted in the viewer in getting killed as well. That cheerful student unexpectedly commits suicide one night by jumping through a glass window and falling to her death. More and more people inexplicably take their lives. When Akane's own boyfriend Takanori gets lassoed into a giant advertising LCD screen, she was hooked into a search for the truth behind this cursed online video and find a way to stop its deadly consequences.
First, the positives.
Akane is played by a very pretty young actress named Satomi Ishihara. She really pulled off the sympathetic character of the tormented teacher. She is very charming and great to look at amidst the horror, and despite the weird "super power" the writer gave her. There was also a little puppy love flashback episode to show how Akane and Takanori first became friends. That was a nice touch.
There is really something so clean about Japanese cinematography. The contrasts are so stark and simple, they look beautiful. Those scenes where Akane was simply walking under the arches of a lonely corridor, or when she was walking on the rooftop against the bright blue sky. So nice and calm.
Next, the negatives.
While the first Ring films successfully conveyed dread and fear with the simple and even crude special effects of Sadako creeping towards her prey. This film goes OVERBOARD with its ridiculously unbridled use of excessive fake-looking computer-generated imagery! Despite this supposedly advanced computer graphics, the parts that were supposed to be 3D, like the hand or the hair that "popped" out of the computer or cellphone monitor, looked very bad indeed.
The most absurd and over-the-top idea of them all is the terrible idea of transforming the iconic scary image of a lone Sadako into a HORDE of monstrous spider-like Sadakos with very long jointed hind legs and vampire-bat-like mouths. The ironic kicker here is that, they apparently can be easily subdued by sweet little Akane, after which they simply dissolve into a swarm of black moths! Senseless and stupid. Certainly, less is more.
Overall, this is a disappointing movie, undeserving of being called a sequel of the original Ring films. I am giving it a couple of extra stars solely because of the beauty and performance of Ms. Satomi Ishihara as Akane. As for the character that gave this movie its name, Sadako sadly lost her edge and practically became a caricature of her original self because of this film's indulgent director.
August 9, 2012
"The Bourne Legacy" has so much hype in this country not only because it rides on the coattails of the amazing Bourne Trilogy starring Matt Damon. Even more significantly, it is due to the fact that a considerable number of scenes had been shot right here locally, in such places as the San Andres Market, the Pasay Rotonda, the Navotas Fishport and Palawan. The shooting of the movie was front page news and was on the daily evening news shows. When the trailer showing the Manila scenes was released, it trended massively on online social networking sites. Everything pointed to a widely successful August 8, 2012 opening date. Unfortunately though, Mother Nature had other ideas, as one of the metropolis' worst monsoon flooding which inundated many parts of the city happened before and right on that day. All of a sudden, "The Bourne Legacy" did not seem that important anymore.I personally felt that this movie, while exciting at parts, did not really live up to the first three Bourne movies. The lead actors Jeremy Renner (as Treadstone Agent Aaron Cross) and Rachel Weiss (as geneticist-virologist Dr. Marta Shearer) did very well in the acting department to keep the scenes vital. However, the story (for a Bourne movie) was uncharacteristically sketchy and really, barely there.This film follows the aftermath of the third Bourne film when his agency Treadstone was already being investigated and threatened with exposure. All remaining Treadstone agents were being systematically eradicated. Cross and Shearer have to evade the government counter forces led by Eric Byer (Edward Norton), who did not really feel like a real danger for our heroes. We learn the "scientific" reason why Treadstone agents have super-human abilities, which was too incredible. The Manila connection was weak and unbelievable. The street chase scenes in Manila were a big blur, and basically what we already saw in the trailer. The ending felt rushed and too convenient. If you knew Philippine geography, the final scenes would be funny.I don't know, but I think I simply expected too much from this movie. It has all the Bourne elements there, but it felt lacking. It was only the charisma and talent of the stars that carried the film. I was disappointed that it did not really show anything iconically Filipino to represent the country. I don't think the jeepney really counts. The slums used could have been any slum in the world. Nothing really positive about the Manila or its people was shown, which was a letdown. If ever there is a sequel though, I would still watch if only for Renner and Weisz, and maybe to find out what else can be done to liven up this series. I would not really count on that sequel too soon though.
August 7, 2012
"Brave" is the story of another feisty Disney princess, given the PIXAR treatment. Her name is Merida, a Scottish princess. She is a headstrong tomboyish teenage who cannot accept the tradition espoused by her strict mother that she is to be betrothed for marriage. Therefore she resorts to witchcraft to change her fate. She really got more than what she bargained for, a shocking development of ursine proportions. She later learns that she has only a couple of days to reverse the terrible spell. Could she?"Brave" is just okay for me overall. It is still better than the last Pixar movie, "Cars 2." While on the surface everything looks good and glossy, especially the archery scenes, there are several things that I did NOT like about "Brave." Art-wise, while Merida and her fiery red hair looked great, the caricature-ish look of the Scotsmen were drawn so much like the Vikings in Dreamworks' "How to Train Your Dragon." The brutish barbaric culture they exhibited likewise shows very little difference from that in "How to Train", aside from the kilts the characters wore in this movie and their Scottish accents.Screenplay-wise, "Brave" goes a little darker and violent, and thus may be too scary or disturbing for young kids. More than that, I did not like how Merida did not immediately take responsibility for the horrible effects of the witch's spell. While many of the other Disney princesses also disobey their parents and get into trouble, those princesses themselves directly suffered the consequences of their disobedience. Here, Merida's insolence put another person in peril. Merida actually did something akin to what the Wicked Witch did in Snow White! Frankly, it is this particularly negative aspect of the story that badly affected my appreciation of this movie as a whole.
August 2, 2012
"Posas" is the Best Picture winner in the last Cinemalaya Film Festival, Director's Showcase category. Honestly, I overlooked this movie during the festival because of the generic title. However, because of its award, I went to see it today when it had a special showing in a nearby mall.
Watching this film is not easy. It is a harrowing experience as the director Lawrence Fajardo literally takes you through the entire experience of a young petty thief named Jestoni Biag (Nico Antonio) on one fateful day when he made the mistake of stealing the iPhone 4S of feisty and sexy call center agent Ms. Maria Grace Resuello (Bangs Garcia).
Without divulging any spoiling details, you as the audience will watch in pained disgust and horror as the policemen who arrest Jestoni, led by Police Officer Domingo (Best Supporting Actor winner Art Acuna), do MORE than simply shackle him in handcuffs. Paraphrasing the tagline, "The day they set him free, was the first day of his life sentence."
You will never want to walk the streets of Quiapo again after watching this film. You will see the underbelly of that district. You will see corruption in actual action. It purports to show how and why the criminal justice system of our country is in shambles. Having the television coverage of the recent Chief Justice impeachment trial in one scene is an effective and telling juxtaposition.
"Posas" is scary. This movie is that gritty and realistic. I dare not imagine how much of this exposition was based on actual facts. It is not a pretty picture of Manila. It is not a pretty picture of our police force. This story needs to be told for our awareness, but it certainly won't do our tourism any favors. It sort of gives us a hopeless feeling after the last frame, and that is a real downer.
"Posas" is really a very well-made film technical-wise, in terms of its cinematography and editing. The actors were really very realistic as in their roles as rouge cops and jaded goons. The heavy drama was lightened by a funny guest appearance of John Lapuz as a silly budol- budol gang victim.
However, the pervasive spirit of negativism in this film is very difficult to accept, and the one factor why, if I were a judge, I would NOT have voted for it as Best Picture award. I would guess though, that in the world of indie critics, that negativism may be more of the norm than the exception.
July 28, 2012
"Sta. Nina" is set in lahar-ravaged Pampanga. A small coffin was unearthed in a quarrying operation. When Pol (Coco Martin) opens the box, the dead little girl encased inside was still intact with no sign of decay. Puzzled, he brings it home with him. His neighbors begin to experience unexplainable healings when they are in the presence of the uncorrupted corpse. Meanwhile, Pol's personal life is also in shambles as he still has bitter years-old conflicts with his estranged wife Madel (Alessandra da Rossi) and her vindictive mother (Irma Adlawan). As Pol struggles to rid himself of the bad luck that hounded him all his life, could the miraculous corpse of little Marikit also prove to be his salvation?Writer and first-time movie director Emmanuel Quindo Palo does not spoon feed us the story. He tells the story in a way that we have to slowly discover the relationships of the characters. The audience is left to guess at these things until they are revealed in due time. I liked that.Religion is the main backbone of this drama. We see scenes of religious fanaticism in the country folks' belief in miraculous cures, as well as in their gory Holy Week traditions. The audience is challenged to reassess their belief or disbelief in miracles. Director Palo also practically goes through the Stations of the Cross en route to a climactic crucifixion scene. He also has a publicly-maligned character that obviously references a real trans-gender ex-Marian visionary Judiel Nieva.We also see scenes seemingly critical of the clergy. Having a comedian well known for portraying a corrupt congressman, Leo Martinez, play the character of the unsympathetic Archbishop is a less than subtle satiric ploy by the director. A direct dig about church donations received a rousing applause from the audience!Coco Martin is not called the "indie prince" for nothing. This guy can really possess the role he is playing, no matter how strange, with so much passion. Alessandra da Rossi is really no-nonsense in her portrayal of Madel, a name obviously derived from Mary Magdalene, the biblical sinner. Of the supporting characters, it is really Ms. Anita Linda who brings the house down with her portrayal of Pol's grandmother stricken with Alzheimer's disease. Two of her wisecracks even got loud rounds of audience applause.To be sure, "Sta. Nina" revisits familiar territory. Folk faith healing miracles had also been the subject of another most-acclaimed Filipino movie "Himala." However, unlike "Himala," "Sta. Nina" is less downbeat in its message and execution. The beautiful cinematography is top notch! Its sold-out audiences in all its showings at this current Cinemalaya Film Festival is a testament of its ability of drawing the audience into its hypnotic spell. This will be a strong contender come awards night.
July 23, 2012
I am a fan of Filipino horror films as I have mentioned in my other reviews. "The Healing" features a big Filipino movie star, Ms. Vilma Santos, in a rare appearance in a horror film. It is also helmed by a director who had been responsible for two of the best Filipino horror films in the last decade, "Feng Shui" (2004) and "Sukob" (2006). The well-made teaser trailer was an effective come-on. It was a given that I should also check out this particular film.
Ms. Vilma plays Seth, a woman who runs a boarding house in a middle- class community in the city. After her father (Robert Arevalo) was successfully treated of his post-stroke condition by a faith healer named Elsa (Daria Ramirez), five of her friends and neighbors all convince Seth to bring them to Elsa to treat them of their various medical maladies. In addition, her son Jed (Martin del Rosario) also brought along his half-sister Cookie (Kim Chiu) so her kidney ailment could be cured.
After that day of the fateful healing, one by one, everyone in that group treated by Elsa begins dying of strange and violent circumstances, each one more bizarre than the last. Before each death, Seth would be visited by a crow and a puzzling vision of her friend's doppelganger. Seth now has to race against time to find out why this macabre series of deadly events is happening and hopefully stop it before everyone in the group kicks the bucket.
After the first minor character dies, you already knew how the story would go. The suspense you will feel as you watch on will be more in anticipation of which gory method with which that character will die, not exactly because you do not know what will happen next. To Rono's credit, each death scene somehow topped the previous one in as much as the blood factor is concerned.
Everyone did well at looking scared. Ms. Vilma Santos is Ms. Vilma Santos. She doesn't really disappear very well into her role as Seth. This is not to say she did not perform well, she did; but her aura as Star for All Seasons and Governor of Batangas is simply too strong to ignore. Kim Chiu appeared in very few scenes despite her second billing. Like on TV, she needs to inject more energy in her performance. I did not know Martin del Rosario before this movie, but he actually delivered very well in his meaty role as Jed. Special mention would have to go to Robert Arevalo for daringly delivering the most embarrassing lines in the movie -- hilarious! Not really sure why Ynez Veneracion had to show her right boob though, maybe for old times sake.
Several camera angles used by Mr. Rono were very well-planned and executed to maximize the tension onscreen. Like other productions I see now, there was color coordination in the costumes of all the characters on screen. Here though, I did not quite see why a certain color was chosen for which scene. It was also distracting sometimes to see the common color scheme continuing into subsequent unrelated scenes. Many common scare tactics and music were employed here -- nothing highly original. But thankfully, at least there was NO Sadako-like creature in this one.
Overall, it is just OK. I think that "The Healing" had been too reminiscent of other horror films the way the friends of the lead character were dying around her and it is up to her to break the curse. If it was Kris Aquino who played Seth instead of Vilma Santos, it would just be "Feng Shui" all over again.
