SIMPLY, FOLKSY

Posted by Jojo Devera ,


     Like the heroine of a silent movie melodrama, Angel (Aliya Raymundo) suffers more than her share of tragic events. But even if director Roman Perez Jr. is sympathetic to the plight he’s chosen for the protagonist, his film never burrows deep enough under her skin to make the string of miserable scenarios connect in a meaningful way. Kalakal (VMX, Pelikula Indiopendent, 2025) casts its lot with simply, folksy, down-in-the-dirt indie realism. All of this is a ruse. Angel is a young woman whose optimism drives the plot and her own life, into numerous ditches. If this fails to immediately communicate the level of misery porn that the viewer is about to be subjected to, the film makes sure to remind everyone of Angel’s hardships at every turn. She is shaded in the most hyperbolically innocent terms possible. Even when performing sex work, Angel has a kindly, almost uncomprehending nature to her, doing the job almost absentmindedly.The film drills down on the ambiguousness of Angel's ability to conceive the sadness of her life when she is with Dario (Gold Aceron). Her relationship naturally dredges up tension from her brother, Gelo (Jero Flores). Kalakal is a drama that examines how society relegates economically disadvantaged women into sex work to survive. The film generates sympathy for its hard-luck protagonist, however, there aren’t many fresh angles to a familiar story of emotionally wounded loners. Perez takes Angel’s inherent sweetness so far that not even Raymundo's performance can keep this character seeming remotely realistic. As Angel's life falls apart, she allows other people to exploit and demean her rather than speak up for herself and once our empathy slips away, Kalakal is minimized to a show of female suffering rather than a human drama or institutional indictment. 

     That Angel’s quest for self-discovery is obtained primarily through interactions (sexual and otherwise) with men is a tell. She delights in becoming a sex worker, though she only shallowly interacts with women employed at the club. Neither screenplay nor direction illuminates the shape of the patriarchal forces that brought them there and given the detail put into the visual components of their world, the lack of material context is glaring. The film no doubt thinks it has its heart in the right place, it just felt like another opportunity to see a young woman get burned at the stake of ignorance and public opinion. There are fascinating stories to be told, but not when the burning serves as the main draw. Like Angel's clients, everything Perez wants to convey is obtrusively front and center, leaving little room for the viewer to have any interpretation for themselves. Sex scenes aren’t worthwhile merely for existing. They should be sweaty and yearning and intrigued by the flesh as much as the personalities within. Perez's lens is not interested in the sex lives of women as much as the ways in which a young woman’s body can be positioned and used. Which isn’t to say sex scenes need to move a plot along or provide narrative purpose for a story. But in a film like Kalakal, where interiority is subsumed by exhibition and sexual expression, they simply carry more burdens. The stark compositions with which Perez frames Angel's suffering add nothing but the thinnest symbolism at the expense of valorizing her pain. Kalakal certainly doesn’t mock its protagonist, but it does trivialize her, reducing Angel to a passive force who can only react with bafflement to the obvious escalation of her misery.


Screenplay: Quiel dela Cruz

Cinematography: Neil Derrick Bion

Production Design: Junebert Cantila

Music: Dek Margaja

Sound Design: Lamberto Casas, Jr., Alex Tomboc

Editing: Aaron Alegre

A Film By: Roman Perez Jr.

QUIETLY RADICAL

Posted by Jojo Devera ,


     A deceptively simple romance doesn’t take away that there is something quietly radical at work in Adolfo Borinaga Alix Jr.'s Siargao set love story, Unconditional (BR Film Productions, 2025). There’s a leap of faith you have to go with in its narrative. In a central scene when Anna (Rhian Ramos) comes to realize that Greg (Allen Dizon) is transgender, you understand that Greg is coming from a place of vulnerability, where the basic idea that any woman will enjoy his company is a surprise to him, perhaps he’s dizzily blinded by attraction. And perhaps the film is pointing out that these labels, while relevant and necessary for an expression of identity, are artificial in a spiritual or psychological way. In most movies about heterosexual women who fall in love with transgender men, the woman in the relationship usually wants to keep the man’s transgender identity a secret, out of fear that she will be shunned by her peers and/or society, Unconditional is no exception. Trans stories where the trans experience isn’t central to the unfolding action are hard to come by. The aim of this film seems to reframe the reaction we typically see when characters reveal themselves to be transgender. Greg and Anna's romance is very sweet and doesn’t move too quickly, punctuated by a passionate and intense love scene. Dizon and Ramos share a chemistry that sizzles. Greg is generally quiet and introverted. He might have had a lot of experience with life’s hardships, but it soon becomes apparent later in the story that he doesn’t have much experience when it comes to love and romance. It’s not spoiler information to reveal that Anna eventually finds out that Greg is transgender. How she finds out won’t be revealed in this review. It’s enough to say that Anna finds out that Greg is a trans man after she’s already fallen for Greg but they haven’t had sex yet. 

     Unconditional is not the type of movie that keeps the same pace throughout the story. There are ebbs and flows, just like there would be in real life. However, there’s some melodrama in the last third that could make or break the romance between Greg and Anna. How it’s resolved is kind of rushed into the story in a way that could happen in real life. The biggest strength lies in the chemistry between Dizon and Ramos. Alix portrays the film’s protagonists with palpable empathy through naturalistic dialogue. Dizon with cagey finesse and Ramos with captivating elegance. Toss in some fantastic supporting work from Elizabeth Oropesa as Greg's mother Dolores, who shifts from one state of body and mind to another without being forced while Lotlot de Leon as his sister Terry is strong and understated. Unconditional is a simple story, but not a simplistic one, with performances that make all the characters seem fully dimensionalized. It eschews melodrama arriving at a lovely, unforced sense of acceptance.There is naivety and acceptance from Greg that makes the film different. It’s a sincere effort that feels earned and in its modest way, a deeply romantic gesture. The movie looks at the big picture through intimate lens. Ultimately, the film’s love story largely succeeds on its strong sense of place. Alix and screenwriter Jerry B. Gracio carefully and respectfully manages the different characters’ points of view, plunging us into a unique world and its inhabitants’ challenges in navigating their place both with and without their respective circles. Together, Allen and Ramos shine. Beautifully realized, Unconditional makes Greg work for what he wants and by the end, both he and the movie have fully earned the reward of our fascinated attention. Unconditional is never in a hurry. But if you’re looking for an immersive love story that takes you places you might not know, that challenges your conception of what romance looks and feels like, Unconditional is a great place to stop.


Direction: Adolfo Borinaga Alix Jr.

Screenplay: Jerry B. Gracio

Director of Photography: Rain Yamson II, LPS

Editing: Xila Oflada, Mark Llona

Production Design: Jhon Paul Sapitula

Music: Marco Morales

Sound Design: Immanuel Verona, Fatima Nerikka Salim


JUST A FUTILE EXERCISE

Posted by Jojo Devera ,


     Dan Villegas' Uninvited (Warner Bros. Pictures, Mentorque Productions, Project 8, 2024) has a big curious twist. The twist is Vilma Santos, the person herself, that the most becalmed and cognitive of movie stars would chose to appear in a revenge flick, that most crass of exploitation genres. Moreover, Villegas has followed behind. They have taken a long look at exploitation revenge pictures and have decided their pedigree alone could elevate such material, literally. They may be right. But that's somewhat unfair. Uninvited is never cheap - righteousness is complicated here. Uninvited, which was refashioned with a major hand from Santos, is a thinly veiled retrospective of her career. The tale is told in jumbled flashbacks, as if nonlinear narrative were a reward in itself. It's not. Uninvited squanders plot impetus and even with constant crosscutting it's lethargically paced, slogging through soap-operatic back stories and maddening irrelevancies. I was eagerly awaiting the chance to watch this film. It seemed a decidedly eclectic mix of action hero with a dash of cerebral stimulation thrown in. Santos’ character, Lilia Capistrano/Eva Candelaria for the majority of the film, is aloof from the viewer. Her reluctance to communicate in anything other than tormented expressions (it seems odd on the stern face of Santos, who has always looked old) and stone cold staring means that at no point do we ever connect with her in a way that will make us care for her like we probably should. Santos, it must be said, delivers another performance that is controlled, but it’s the frustrating lack of intimacy with her situation that, for me, makes this film feel flat. Give her credit for stepping into an exercise this provocative, but an exercise is what it remains, the itch to blast away too easily steadied by the itch to reassure. 

     Villegas seems to have relied more on the audience's perception of the situation than trying to give us any kind of real meaning. The fact that we know how we would act in this situation, will predispose us to feel one way or another about Lilia's own predicament; it provokes ideas in our own memory that stand in the way of anything in the film being fresh or new. And Villegas seems unable to redress that imbalance. By being biased to the situation, we are unable to see past the actions of the protagonist as anything other than simplistic, clichéd emotional churlishness. Unfortunately, the plotting is rather pedestrian and often flawed, undermining this film’s potential for greatness. By the time the big moment arrives when Lilia faces Guilly Vega (Aga Muhlach) who raped and murdered her daughter, Lily (Gabby Padilla) and irreversibly changed her life, it’s clear what kind of movie Uninvited ultimately wants to be. Without giving anything away, let’s just say that the film is completely drained of any remaining irony at this point, abandoning intellectual honesty in favor of giving the viewer what they want. It elicits no real sympathy for Lilia, who in the revenge process turns into a cartoonish character. And even though it ends with some hope that our heroine can find redemption, it all seemed like just a futile exercise in grandstanding for Villegas who seemed to care less about the justice system. What Uninvited tries so hard to deliver and what it ultimately fails at, is generating sympathy for our main character. With top class production values, Uninvited should have been a cut above your standard revenge thriller. Lilia should get revenge and we should feel satisfied vicariously. Yet while the story does conclude more or less the way it ought to, it doesn’t have the feeling of catharsis that a revenge thriller needs. Somewhere over the course of Uninvited, most of the flavor has gone out.


Directed By: Dan Villegas

Written By: Dodo Dayao, FSG

Director of Photography: Pao Orendain, LPS

Production Designer: Michaela Tatad-King

Film Editor: Marya Ignacio

Musical Scorer: Len Calvo

Sound Designer: Allen Roy Santos


CREATIVE, HAUNTING

Posted by Jojo Devera ,

     Right from the start of Chito S. Roño's Espantaho (Quantum Films, Cineko Productions, Purple Bunny Productions, CSR Films.Ph., 2024), Lorna Tolentino as Rosa emotes substantially with expressions alone, but is also wholly capable of delivering her lines convincingly – her voice and guarded body language is exactly of someone who has a terrible secret. This is her film and she makes it work. Tolentino also nicely complements Judy Ann Santos, who takes on a more subdued, contemplative persona as Monet. There is poignancy in her bewilderment. Chanda Romero plays Adele with every nerve frayed, every emotion on the surface of her face. In context, young Kian Co's performance as Keith, works beautifully. Fortunately, there are no weak links here, even in the minor, supporting parts, which is essential in a horror film – especially one with supernatural elements. Espantaho is a horror picture on the outside, but it also does a striking job of how people cope with tragedies and disquieting attitudes. But more than anything else, the crux of the story – is unforgettable. It’s a creative, haunting attribute that sets the stage for numerous, expertly crafted sequences of terror. But just as scary, or at least as unsettling, is the film's presentation of human existence as an endless series of tragedies and agonies, relieved only by foolish distraction. The heart of Espantaho is in the conversations between Rosa and Monet, as well as between Monet and the frazzled Adele. Roño builds and sustains an eerie mood made up of equal parts tension and despair. Unlike ninety percent of films, Espantaho gets better as it goes along. I have to admit I was blind-sided by the ending. 

     The solution to many of the film’s puzzlements is right there in plain view and the movie hasn’t cheated, but the very boldness of the storytelling carried me right past the crucial hints and right through to the end of the film, where everything takes on an intriguing new dimension. Chris Martinez's screenplay is a perfect example of misdirection. The way he frames the story and the interactions characters have with each other are subtle enough on a first watch, but clever and obvious on subsequent viewings. Once Roño reveals the reason for all this, Santos' performance takes on a sense of poignancy. Monet's love for Rosa is a crucial facet of Espantaho and she demonstrates it flawlessly. It has a kind of calm, sneaky self-confidence that allows it to take us down a strange path, intriguingly. Roño's main concerns are isolation and the strains and tensions of family ties. Espantaho is an attention-grabbing fusion of minimalism and overstatement. The horror story is shot as Andrei Tarkovsky might have shot it, with briefly glimpsed figures on the fringes and with constant ambiguities of action and attitude. Setting the mood persuades us that an unseen intruder is about to pounce. Here, Roño is in top form. The camerawork by Neil Daza is gorgeous and shadowy, making much use of Roño’s expert framing and camera blocking. Plus, the music by Von de Guzman adds to the chilling, mysterious effect that the director wants to create, but the movie lays realistic groundwork for the supernatural events to come. And when they come, they are all the more unsettling for being rather matter-of-fact. Espantaho is an impressively well-rounded, triumphant thriller, full of unexpectedly positive themes that transcend its typical classification as a mere horror flick. 


A Film By:  Chito S. Roño

Screenplay: Chris Martinez

Director of Photography: Neil Daza, LPS

Production Design: Angel B. Diesta, PDGP

Editor: Benjo Ferrer

Music: Von de Guzman

Sound: Alex Tomboc, Lamberto Casas Jr.


 

THROUGH NORA AUNOR'S EYES

Posted by Jojo Devera ,


     Fandom comes in many forms, whether you’re talking about the different subgenres of the pop-culture obsessed or the types of fans themselves and how they choose to express that devotion as individuals. It’s no wonder that after decades of pop culture obsession gradually morphing into a globally recognized phenomenon, we’ve taken to documenting fandom on film, through both fictional and nonfictional accounts of people willing to go very far, maybe even too far, for the things they love. Infused with a fresh, crowded sense of community, Adolfo Borinaga Alix, Jr.'s Faney (The Fan) (Frontrow Entertainment, Intele Builders, Noble Wolf, AQ Films, 2025) is anchored by an emotionally wrought yet effective turn by Laurice Guillen. She etches an unforgettable screen character in Lola Milagros/Bona, a woman whose complexities and eccentricities match her dignity and willpower. While Althea Ablan is authentic and funny as Bea, Milagros' great granddaughter, Gina Alajar's Babette is the real lynchpin, the part that truly holds the film together. It is too easy to overlook what she does because she plays daughter to Guillen's mother, but she is arguably the most important character because Babette embodies the kind of innate decency to which all the other characters must aspire. Of course, fandom can get out of one’s control, which is what happens in Faney’s most entertaining subplot involving Pacita M. (Roderick Paulate). Added to this, we find it exploring themes of family – particularly the challenges of mother-daughter relationships and how they can usually be softened by speaking from the heart. 

     The film is more nuanced and it points out that nostalgia lies and simplifies, but it's also yearning and swooning enough that it doesn't mind us being nostalgic. It wants the viewer to be more sensible and objective, so we're thinking about the characters as characters. Loss is something that everyone processes differently and much has been written about the fact that no two people mourn in the same way, which is precisely why no one has been able to craft the definitive text on grief, despite it being one of the most common philosophical and artistic motifs across all of human history. Because of its strong sense of character development, Faney touches a plethora of emotional chords. It is unabashedly sentimental with tear-filled scenes, plenty of hugs and moments of downright existential angst. Yet there are also moments of lightness sprinkled throughout and, deep intimacy and exceptional believability, as well as a dash of full-on humor, that makes things far less dour than they otherwise easily could have been. The poignancy of Lola Milagros’ visit to Nora Aunor’s gravesite is calculated to make the audience join her in regretting that she’s come to the end of her devotion. We too can feel a palpable absence, ready to believe that she’s really gone. It’s hard to imagine another director doing a more loving, thorough job with this material. Through the extraordinary grace of Alix’s filmmaking which revels in the transmutational power of filmmaking itself, Faney renders it larger than life. The film lives on Guillen's performance and she once again shows, as she did in last year’s Guardia de Honor that she’s up to the task of shouldering such a complex character with seeming ease. Faney is a celebration of a pop culture phenomenon. By the end, we're looking at Lola Milagros and the world, through Nora Aunor's eyes. It does work off the conventions that rule more ordinary movies, but only to enrich its own singular voice. 


Sound Design: Roy Santos

Production Design: Jhon Paul Sapitula

Editing: Xila Ofloda, Mark Llona

Music: Mikoy Morales

Director of Photography: Odyssey Flores

Written and Directed By Adolfo Borinaga Alix, Jr.

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