Initially, the circumstances in Kasalanan Bang Sambahin Ka? (Viva Films, 1990) are innocent enough. Alex (Julio Diaz), a soon to be married executive goes on a date with Catherine (Vivian Velez), a stock broker. They're obviously attracted to each other, but when they move beyond the flirting stage to Catherine's apartment, where they make love on the stairs, the sex is explosively erotic, but at the same time, funny. Chito Roño knows how to give audiences their vicarious kicks. He excites them, then gives a little release by making them laugh. Alex and Catherine spend one night and part of the next day together in the way that one seldom does except in the first flush of a new love affair. Very quickly they establish an easy intimacy and in her head, Catherine is already making plans for the future. After one night, she falls in love, he doesn't. The movie, written by Jose Javier Reyes has a rock-solid premise although it's an odd one for a thriller, it works beautifully. Kasalanan Bang Sambahin Ka? has an inescapable pull to it, it's suffocatingly exciting. Roño's direction has seductive sharpness and precision. On the surface, the story is a female revenge fantasy, it's the expression of every woman's anger on the morning after a one-night stand when the lovemaking is over and the man has left and that empty, used-up feeling starts to creep in. But the movie takes the man's point of view, not the woman's, it's about the male fear of female emotions, their dread that casual pleasure-taking will turn into messy entanglements.
All this, which adds up to make the point that there is no such thing as safe sex is banked into the subtext and because it builds on existing sexual fears, the movie may come across as being more serious than it is. Kasalanan Bang Sambahin Ka? is deep but only superficially. Roño is interested in ideas only to the extent that they buttress the thriller aspect of his story. But he's savvy in his titillating, manipulative way about sexual attitudes. He knows for example, that Alex's troubles with Catherine tighten his bond to his fiancée Grace (Dawn Zulueta). What this enables Roño to do is create a sense that something is at stake. Roño is particularly good at conveying the affection between Alex and Grace. But as Grace, Zulueta makes the job easy for him. She's spectacular here. The sexiest moment in the movie, in fact, isn't the one in which Velez and Diaz first make love, but the one in which Alex looks at Grace from across the table. Grace is presented as a model, modern woman, good-spirited, self-deprecating, efficient but she doesn't come across as a drudge. She's happy in her life, fulfilled. In other words, she's everything Catherine would like to be but isn't. Catherine has a career and just about nothing else. Clearly, the filmmakers would like us to see her as the down side of the women's movement, the woman who bought all the rhetoric and missed out on her chance for happiness. Whatever the history though, her fling with Alex pushes her over the edge.
The part of Catherine is essentially that of a hysteric and it's not a flattering one, but Velez doesn't recoil from this woman or try to soften her. Velez plunges deep into this woman's derangement and her level of involvement gives it a greater validity, you can't just cross her off as a crazy. This is by far the most exposed Velez has allowed herself to be in her movie roles, she's never had this kind of forcefulness. The pain and anger in her portrayal are frighteningly potent perhaps because they're just an extension of the normal gut-wrenching awfulness everybody experiences when love affairs go sour. The rage she expresses is mythically feminine. Still, she's a profoundly unsympathetic figure. Strangely enough, the film's sympathy goes to Alex, even though he's the one who must suffer for his indiscretion. Alex isn't an exciting man, he's settled and a little complacent. That puts him right within Julio Diaz's range. He is skillful without really engaging you. I think he's wrong for swashbuckling parts, he's too average but he can convey goodness and he's sexy in a kind of nonthreatening way, he's decent. There are things wrong with Kaslanan Bang Sambahin Ka? Once the central situation is laid out, it evolves pretty much the way you thought it might. Also, presenting Diaz as such a nice guy robs the character of some of his vitality, a little darkness in his soul might have added another dimension. Roño screws things down pretty tight, though. This is a spectacularly well-made thriller. It's being as effective as it is may not, in the long run, be such a plus. It is an odd thing, really, the movie is sexy and at the same time a warning about the costs of sex. It contributes to the atmosphere of sexual paranoia. And is that something we really need?
Production Designer: Charlie Arceo
Cinematographer: Jun Pereira
Sound Supervision: Albert Rima
Film Editor: Joe Solo
Musical Director: Willy Cruz
Screenplay: Jose Javier Reyes
Additional Screenplay: Racquel Villavicencio
Directed By: Chito Roño
