SARI-SARING SINENG PINOY

Lumapit... Lumayo Ang Umaga

Lumapit... Lumayo Ang Umaga (LEA Productions) seems to ask the question Can a woman love two men simultaneously? Or it can also ask Can a woman continue to love a man after he disappears for the required number of years to allow her to marry and fall in love with a second husband? The film poses these questions and proposes an answer absent of the all-important economic matter. In effect, Lumapit... Lumayo Ang Umaga makes the love triangle the problem when in reality it really is a matter of economics. Amy (Elizabeth Oropesa) is a fish vendor who bumps into Vic (Dante Rivero), falls in love with him and marries him. She mothers his child while he is imprisoned. Vic never revealed his past to her. He disappears from her life completely. Enter William (George Estregan), a rich Chinese businessman who offers Amy his love, money, understanding, faith and trust. Very maturely, the second marriage is one of love after marriage or so the film implies, whereas the first was young, impulsive, first love. Vic returns after nine years and expects Amy to come back to him. This situation becomes the source of conflict. Despite the fact that the film is technically smart and the dialogue sparkling, Lumapit... Lumayo Ang Umaga fails to pose the real conflict. From the start, there is the economic struggle that is a strong controlling factor in the character's motivations. Vic murders because of economic struggle. Amy works in the market for money and lies about her marital state to apply for a job.

Amy's life and future with Vic was undoubtedly, financially insecure. William accepts her for who she is, obviously, her life changed. Vic would be a thing of the past. A beautiful memory maybe, but not the source of a credible conflict. How could Amy think of changing her life at this point? Not her life and certainly not her children's. If at one point William was shown as an unreasonable husband who doubts or blames her for her past, then we could believe that she would have wished for her old life despite the economic problems. However, William offers no problems whatsoever, he is the ideal, good man-husband. Rather than making this love angle a melodramatic problem, the film would have been more mature and interesting if it chose to show how a young, first love becomes a thing of the past that dies because of the changes that come about with economic advantages that alter the lives and attitudes of the people involved. Most mature people will have pasts, lovely and sentimental which pale and recede in the context of the present. The new person who would have emerged after years of a different kind of a life, challenges and demands. Elizabeth Oropesa is outstanding as Amy, Dante Rivero and George Estregan equally so. Lumapit... Lumayo Ang Umaga is good melodrama although it could have been a good mature film.

Screenplay And Direction: Ishmael Bernal
Story By: Liwayway A. Arceo
Serialized In Liwayway Magazine
Director Of Cinematography: Jun Rasca
Music By: The Vanishing Tribe
Film Editor: Nonoy Santillan
Art Director: Francisco Balangue
Release Date: October 17, 1975

Metro Manila Film Festival

Christmas is the season for counting our blessings and the biggest blessing in sight for the local movie industry is the Metro Manila Film Festival, the oldest and most important film event that has brought life to the movie industry. Continuing the Manila Film Festival started in 1966 in the City of Manila, the Metro Manila Film Festival which took over in 1975 has annually provoked  a flurry of creative activity among movie producers. It may be said that producers who generally make mere movies during the year go out of their way to make films for the Festival. Even a partial list of films inspired by the Festival is as impressive as one can get. Ganito Kami Noon, Paano Kayo Ngayon?, Minsa'y Isang Gamu-Gamo and Insiang (1976), Burlesk Queen, Kung Mangarap Ka't Magising and Inay (1977), Atsay and Rubia Servios (1978), Ina Ka Ng Anak Mo (1979), Brutal and Bona (1980), Kisapmata (1981), Himala and Moral (1982). Clearly, creative energies have been released by the Festival in the past. In 1983, the Festival has acquired a new dimension because of the Manila International Film Festival. Instead of merely aiming at the local market, the Metro Manila Film Festival looks at the foreign market. As a consequence, the criteria for entrance into the Festival have been slightly changed to gear them to the international market. The sub-criteria of the Festival follow from that general guideline.

1. Themes that portray positive realities without exploiting misery, desperation and the negative values that find no redemption.


2. Themes that seek to establish the Filipino identity of strength, perseverance and triumph over odds.


3. New and relatively unorthodox themes that will find universal appeal regardless of race, creed or religion.


 4. Themes that depict the rewards of struggle for betterment of life.

A fair look at the Festival, then involves not only art but also commerce. It promotes local movies, selling them not only as good artistic films, but as commercially viable films. The phenomenal box office success of films such as Brutal and Kisapmata which have no stars, hardly any sex or even action made lots of money primarily because they won awards for their artistic merits. In short, one way to make a film sell is to make a good film. Without any doubt, it is the Metro Manila Film Festival that has placed local movies on the cinema map. 

Kaming Matatapang Ang Apog

Time and again, Ading Fernando has proven he has an expert hand in the writing and directing of comedy. His familiarity with the idiosyncrasies of the Filipino's funny bone has earned remarkable success for many of his TV comedy series and some of the movies he has been involved with in his excursions into the film medium. His aim is unerring again in Kaming Matatpang Ang Apog (RVQ Productions). Confidence in Fernando's ability is such, that when Dolphy wants to safeguard his bet, his services as a director and particularly as scriptwriter is sought. In Kaming Matatapang Ang Apog, Fernando has created more than a moderately successful comedy. It is a comic treat with a judicious sprinkling of social commentary and melodrama. Fernando takes a simple storyline as his basic ingredient and develops it slowly by garnishing it heavily with ridiculous incidents and humorous quips. Since in a comedy like this the storyline is only secondary, the pacing does not drag. The viewer is constantly entertained that we barely notice the thinness of the plot nor its slow development. Dolphy and Nora Aunor are competent while the rest of the cast do their routines with ease. This relaxed style which is an indispensable asset for comedy comes from long experience. Between them and the rest of the major characters, they have more than enough to spare.

As the stereotype of Filipino comedy, the gullible underdog who is the butt of jibes and the victim of unfortunate circumstances, Dolphy is the target of much of the audience's laughter, but earns their sympathy all the way. I laughed at many of the jokes and the film makes me surer than ever that Nora Aunor is an excellent comedienne and that Fernando has an uncanny understanding of what makes the audience laugh. The veteran comedians composed of Pugo, Chichay, Babalu and Teroy de Guzman have had so many occasions to work together that they know each other's acting technique quite well. This familiarity is essential for comedy to achieve perfect timing and the appearance of spontaneity. Fortunately, in Kaming Matatapang Ang Apog, Ading Fernando is not content to whip up a mere frothy dish of humor. He unobtrusively injects a fair amount of social commentary to lend substance to the film. He zeroes in on some idealized Filipino practices. In Urbano's (Dolphy) quest to win Poinciana's (Aunor) love, he resorts to the hallowed practice of panunuyo and pamanhikan. These traditions are often romanticized in films, but Fernando chooses to focus on the greed and exploitation that are often attached to these traditions. The rendition is still designed to evoke laughter, but the potshots hit the marks savagely. In numerous films, Dolphy has demonstrated a solid grasp of the way of life of his legions. Often, his comic insights carry him close to the borderline of tragedy, where all true comic art belongs. But in Kaming Matatapang Ang Apog, Dolphy comes to us with no new insight, with only his talent as a comic. The talent is undeniably a great one. As a comedian, Dolphy has managed to escape the trap of sentimentality, an abyss which has claimed even the redoubtable Jack Lemmon. After all there are far too many imitations of Dolphy for Dolphy to turn himself into one.

Screenplay And Direction: Ading Fernando
Director Of Photography: Manuel Bulotano
Music: Dominic Salustiano
Film Editor: Efren Jarlego
Produced By: RVQ Productions
Release Date: September 17, 1976

Gabun

Maryo J. de los Reyes' second feature Gabun (Agrix Films Production, Inc.) invites memories of the triangular romances that flourished in the 60's, those Lolita Rodriguez-Marlene Dauden-Eddie Rodriguez starrers. Rodriguez, is cast fittingly  enough as Gabun's central character, a prosperous entrepreneur named Jaime Solis. For almost two decades, he has successfully maintained a pair of contented families. Chedeng (Liza Lorena), his spouse on the other side has willingly shared his secret throughout but his rightful wife Mameng (Charito Solis), their son Jun (Lloyd Samartino) and his son by Chedeng, Adrian (Michael Sandico) have been kept in the dark all this time. Jun and Adrian, both on the brink of manhood are brought together by their common interests, sports, discos and girls despite belonging to two different  income brackets and social circles. In the course of their conversation, Adrian discovers his parents clandestine arrangement and is temporarily disillusioned. Almost concurrently, Mameng catches up on her husband's misdeeds and together with her son, reacts unforgivingly to the trauma by banishing the offender from their abode. With the roof caving in on his life, including a business gone bankrupt, Jaime deteriorates into a desperate alcoholic. The devotion shown Jaime by his second family fails to dissuade him from his self-inflicted penance. The ordeal ends for him when, having wrongly assumed a murder by his own hands, he comes to realize the totality of his downfall and ends his life. At his funeral, the widows and their sons literally join hands in a mournful reconciliation.

Religiously adapted from the one-act stage play by Tony Perez, Tom Adrales' insufficiently premeditated scenario unwittingly draws questions concerning the plausibility of its dramatic circumstances. Didn't Adrian ever wonder why his father barely spent nights with them? If he did, what reason could his mother have possibly held up to him for so long? Could it have really taken Mameng almost two decades to finally chance upon her husband's infidelity? De los Reyes' treatment of Adrales' shortsighted screenplay likewise presents an indiscriminate transposition of stage and screen techniques. The recurring appearance of the mysterious lady in black with a dead white pigeon hanging from her waistband, presumably intended as an ominous symbol is laughable in its theatricality. De los Reyes obviously wills rather than wields Gabun's mistakenly intrinsic gravity as a tragedy. The performances, particularly those of Rodriguez and Sandico are overly deliberate and purposeful even during easy or intimate moments, in this, they are abetted by Adrales' cumbersome dialogue. The film's sense of self-importance is such that its two normal teenagers are incapable of sporting casual nicknames, but must instead repeatedly address each other with undue formality. De los Reyes is sensitive not to the inherent possibility of his widely diverse material but rather to the stereotypes which reflects influence of the prevailing narrow-minded outlook towards a medium which more than any other, may take on the complexities of life itself.

Directed By: Maryo J. de los Reyes
Based On The One-Act Play By: Tony Perez
Screenplay By: Tom Adrales
Director Of Photography: Joe Batac, Jr.
Musical Director: Idan Cortez
Film Editor: Edgardo "Boy" Vinarao
Production Design: Fiel Zabat
Produced By: Agrix Films Production, Inc.
Release Date: September 7, 1979

Palengke Queen

Arman Reyes and Freddie Sarrol's Palengke Queen (JayVee Film Productions) is a commercial feature if nothing else. There are the sure fire elements. Rich boy and poor girl, rags to riches, revenge, love. This is a film in the grand tradition of Philippine cinema based on the komiks phenomenon. One minor crisis follows another exactly as one would want to read in a weekly serial. There's always a deep sense of loss when a promising filmmaker such as Arman Reyes loses his touch and churns out a terrible movie. Palengke Queen, no matter how one looks at it is simply awful. Take the characterization of the three brothers for instance. Why are they so ineffectual? How could Tibang (Nora Aunor) have remained the servile sister in such a household? Even the sequence in which Robert  (Mat Ranillo III) offers them two cases of beer is inconclusive. The film didn't bother to show the effect of the bribery on Robert's courtship. Or take Mang Poncing (Joonee Gamboa) who suddenly transforms into a responsible father when he inherits wealth. No logical explanation is ever offered for his sudden change of behavior. Even his chronic cough simply vanished into thin air. How about the supporting characters in the market? They seem merely to have gotten old. If there are going to be minor characters, why not use them to move the story forward.

There is merit of course in the revenge theme. One applauds when Tibang refuses to have Doña  Carmela (Celia Rodriguez) kiss her foot. But someone used to the religious undertones of Filipino movies can easily guess that the heroine, no matter how much she wants to get even will never go through with such an unchristian act. There are, in other words no surprises in this film. Nora Aunor is a good actress. As Tere in Ishmael Bernal's Ikaw Ay Akin (1978), she was brilliant, holding her own against Vilma Santos' challenging performance. As the title character in Lino Brocka's Bona (1980), she was even more brilliant, handling the subtle and difficult role with ease and maturity. Not even Aunor's acting, however, cannot save Palengke Queen from being a very bad film. Reyes succeeds in neutralizing Aunor's magic.  He delivers a story which does not allow Aunor a chance to display her talents. Reyes made a thoroughly commercial film. Perhaps the real problem lies with the material's komiks roots. Komiks is a medium that has, in hundreds of films proven to be unadaptable to the screen. Palengke Queen proves it beyond a doubt.

Directed By: Arman Reyes And Freddie Sarrol
Story By: Pat V. Reyes Serialized In Bondying Weekly Movie Specials Komiks
Screenplay By: Arman Reyes, Ricky Dalu And Freddie Sarrol
Cinematography: Gener Buenaseda
Music: Venancio Saturno
Film Editor: Oscar Dugtong
Production Design: Jeorge Hernandez
Produced By: JayVee Film Productions
Release Date: August 6, 1982
Palengke Queen theme song performed by Nora Aunor