Directed by Ma-an L. Asuncion-Dagñalan, Home Service (Viva Films, 3:16 Media Network, 2023) follows nursing student/massage therapist Happy (Hershie de Leon) as she goes about her business over the course of a few ordinary days–with the film primarily detailing Happy's encounters with clients and friends alike. In cinematic terms, the stunt fails dismally. Once the novelty wears off, there's nothing to hold onto, no meaningful insight into either the character or De Leon herself. There are layers upon layers here-but it’s unclear whether De Leon is a face in search of an expression. That may be the point, or it may be just that De Leon doesn't know how to modulate her performance. Either way, she's a plank, which is not much to build a movie on. Whatever the film has to say is obscured by De Leon's uncommunicative performance. Her persona simply becomes redundant with her role leading to an echo chamber of empty referents. Dagñalan has, as anticipated, infused Home Service with a consistent visual sensibility that initially compensates for the film’s uneventful atmosphere, and there’s little doubt that the almost total lack of context or exposition is, for a little while, not quite as problematic as one might have feared. It does reach a point, however, at which the relentlessly meandering narrative becomes impossible to overlook, with the progressively less-than-enthralling vibe exacerbated by the central character’s underdeveloped nature–as screenwriter Michael Angelo Dagñalan is simply unable (or unwilling) to get inside Happy’s head to a satisfactory degree (i.e. what makes this girl tick? why does she do the things she does? etc). It’s subsequently rather difficult to work up any interest in Happy’s mundane exploits, and although the movie does boast an admittedly authentic feel, Home Service‘s few positive elements are inevitably rendered moot by its ongoing emphasis on small-talk-type conversations. It’s impossible not to wish that the director would pay as much attention to the story as she does to visuals and atmosphere.
Home Service is ultimately timid and evasive. It relies far too much on its self-consciously oblique approach, which tends to take center stage, and far too little on genuine insight into the world it represents. The filmmaker’s mistake seems to be supposing that the awfulness of most of these people means there is no high drama to be extracted from their lives. Home Service's narrative merely distracts from its dead-end cynicism. Dagñalan's title refers to the services of working students which include whatever a client desires. It's no surprise, the physical contact comes off as cold, clammy, and mechanical. The topics of conversation invariably revolve around money or the ways in which Happy balances her professional life and personal desires, though Dagñalan investigates these subjects with hastiness, routinely linking every character’s behavior and emotion to cash concerns, but going no further. Although there’s hardly a plot to speak of, the tale eventually hinges on Happy’s decision to break her own rules. She finally lets her guard down and is punished accordingly, learning a lesson both she and we, at this point in the proceedings, already know: that there’s no such thing as real passion, only mutual satisfaction.Yet during this signature moment, when her protagonist actually dares to feel something, Dagñalan finds no way to make us invested in her gambit, she has kept everything at arm’s length.
Screenplay: Michael Angelo Dagñalan
Director of Photography: T.M. Malones
Editor: Gilbert Obispo
Production Design: Jay Custodio
Music: Dek Margaja
Sound Design: Fatima Nerikka Salim
Directed by Ma-an L. Asuncion-Dagñalan
