CHRISTMAS AT THE MOVIES: MMFF 2017

I had the privilege of screening all the eight movies selected as entries for this year's
MetroManila Film Festival.
Even at the start, there was already controversy.
With the overhaul (again) of this year's Executive Committee came the rain of fire and brimstone
due to the noticeable elimination of certain personalities identified as the reformists of the
festival mounted the year before.
For indeed, 2016 was a very different year for the annual fiesta of Philippine movies: movies like
Avid Llongoren's Saving Sally or Baby Ruth Villarama's Sunday Beauty Queen would have
never reached mainstream screens if not for the radical changes which were implemented.
But going hand in hand with this is the unpreparedness of the audience to be served such
genres as live action/animation mix or a documentary film to be part of what used to be a
horror/romcom/fantasy Christmas smorgasbord.
This unpreparedness translated into far much smaller box office receipts. Yes, the numbers still
hit the hundreds of millions but not enough by certain standards. Although there was a relatively
decent gross at the end of an abbreviated festival, the numbers did not come even close to the
record breaking 2015 when the total amount earned by the eight entries grossed over a billion
pesos.

And to put it bluntly, business is business.

Movie making is a multi-million peso business. So is owning chains of theater outlets. Christmas
is that specific time of the year when people have extra cash (and kids, most especially) to
spend on entertainment. In our country, Christmas is a good time ... perhaps the only time for
some to have families flock together and watch movies.
I do not think a P250-270 to now close to P300 per ticket is something easily affordable to
somebody earning a salary on the minimum wage scale.
Watching a movie has become a luxury for the masa so let us stop deluding ourselves into
thinking that it is the madlang taongbayan who are actually filling Vice Ganda movies to the
rafters. No, no, no: it is the middle class who can watch, re-watch and fill the cinemas because
of their buying power and money reserved for amusement. The masa
sets aside their Christmas money to watch the movie of their choice but perhaps one or at most
two of the festival offerings.

There is great purpose, sense of mission and nobility in the crusade to reform and redirect the
festival into a showcase of the best of Filipino movies.
The hope of some to bring back the glory days of the MMFF that produced films like Mike de
Leon's Kisapmata, Marilou Diaz Abaya's Rizal or Laurice Guillen's Tanging Yaman seem so
long ago and far away. This is most especially after the Best Picture Category became
tantamount to the Top Grosser among the entries.

The commercialization of the December film festival has always been there (because it was still
the Dolphy, Vic Sotto and other lighthearted films which bagged the top position in terms of

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earnings. But now commercialism has become more blatant, more in your face ... and,
unfortunately, more uncontrollable because of the present structure of the movie industry and its
sister businesses.

It should be made clear that the movie business is not only ruled by producers who create and
market the products and content. It is more controlled if not dictated upon by movie theater
owners who call the shots as to what movies may be shown --- or how long they will stay on the
screen.

Naturalmente the money generating movies will have the privilege of accommodation and
increasing number of screening outlets while those with poor audience response will certainly
give in to those with greater demand. (Note: turning on the air conditioning of an entire movie
house with only two to three people watching is definitely a losing proposition.)
What applies here is the law of supply and demand. The greater the number of people flocking
to your movie, the more cinemas you will get to accommodate the swelling crowd. And when
your film does not deliver the numbers, so sorry ... such is life. That is when the producer is
confronted with the fact that ---yes, that is business which is what the MetroManila Film Festival
is all about.

But there is also an urgent need to address the issue of giving a chance to other films not to be
pulled out of cinemas all that easily. Somehow an opening day screening cannot be justice to
enough to be tugged out of your venue just because one or two of the entries turned out to be
juggernauts.
Nothing can be done as far as the selection of what movies to screen during the December
festival outside MetroManila because the mandate of the festival only covers a certain perimeter
or domain of cinemas in the country.

That is why certain movies are not showing in the provinces not because the MMFF is unfair in
its distribution but because theater owners choose not to show the likes of Larawan or Siargao
and opt to ride on the bandwagon of The Revenger Squad, Panday or Meant to Bae. These are
the crowd drawers and the movie houses do not only want but need the crowds. T here is
nothing illegal about that: it is the choice of theater owners and they are thinking in terms of
what makes good business.

However all this does not say much about boosting the quality of Filipino movies or defining
what is the true value of success in cinema. This is exactly what the reformists are fighting for.
Although millions of pesos are invested not only in the production but also in the marketing and
promotions of movies, success nowadays has been simplified to earning more than P100M in
the box office to qualify as a blockbuster.

Who cares if members of the Manunuri ng Pelikulang Pilipino go into epileptic fits from the sheer
torture of sitting through a particularly bad movie?

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Critics are there to be ... uh, critics. Yet as one of my colleagues in the academe resignedly told
me, "Who cares what critics say? I do not think your legendary Aleng Tacing who is addicted to
tired and beaten plots of telenovelas read what critics opine in their popular blogs." The proof of
the pudding is in the tasting: the multi-million earnings of the studio justify the choice, style or
substance of the products they field out during Christmas.

You cannot argue with more than half a billion earnings to qualify as success. So let that be.
In the meantime what is important is to find ways of pushing other films in the consciousness of
the Filipino moviegoer --- not only during Christmas time but throughout the other eleven
months of the year. In a free-for-all set-up like the December festival, every producer clamors for
a position to make the most out of an end-of-the-year profit. So it is expected that big time
companies will muscle their way to find a slot in the MMFF.

Christmas time is when the biggest local blockbusters of the year are fielded --- a do or die
situation for some major film studios to achieve their quota of annual profits or to provide icing to
their proverbial year long cake. No amount of argumentation about the "significance of art" or
"uplifting the taste of the Filipino moviegoers" will receive a predictable reply of, "Oh, come on.
Get real" as studio executives are hosting their victory parties after their thanksgiving mass.
But let's get real indeed.

Yes, you get your more than half a billion movies to boost the annual income of a studio ... not
necessarily locking out all other alternatives or diminishing the choices of the audience. There is
still a chunk of the movie going public (like the ones who provided the P400M+ earnings of
2016) who want something different, something a little bit more substantial than fantasy or
horror movies --- and Punch and Judy shows.

If commerce should be the principal consideration for the MMFF, then let it be so. We
understand. However, what other producers need is a fighting chance that should be given to
other forms of filmmaking aside from those railroaded by the giant studios. That is the only other
consolation the Filipino audience can get from the December movie fiesta of local films.
Like in this year's festival, two movies should be given due attention and importance because of
what they aspired to achieve.

"Ang Larawan" by its very nature is a film that is not only worth watching. This should be part of
one's repertoire of films that must be seen in your lifetime together with other must-see Filipino
movies that define who we are, what we have become and the possibilities of what is to come.
Based on a play by a national artist with a book at libretto by another national artist and set to
music by someone who will soon be another national artist, there is no way that this film
directed by Loy Arcenas lacks gravitas. It is the heart and soul of this year's festival ... and
perhaps one of the two reasons that this December will be remembered.
The film is not perfect: at times it does not feel like a film at all but a theater piece captured by a
camera.

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But glossing over that and focusing on the love and passion given by the director and everyone
else in the making of this movie should be reason enough to commend its very act of creation.
The original film version of Nick Joaquin's Portrait of the Artist as Filipino was produced in 1965
by Manuel de Leon and directed by another national artist, Lamberto Avellana with an
adaptation for the screen by Trinidad Reyes and Donato Valentin. Portrait starred Daisy
Avellana and Naty Crame-Rogers as Candida and Paula Marasigan with Vic Silayan as Bitoy
Camacho and Conrad Parham as Tony Javier. This was a direct adaptation of Joaquin's
English play about the burden of tradition and the death of an era, a elegy in three acts as he so
described.

Portrait also saw its Pilipino translation when it was mounted by the Philippine Educational
Theater Association (PETA) with the incomparable Lolita Rodriguez portraying Paula to Rita
Gomez' Candida (directed by PETA Founder, Cecille Guidote). Then Rodriguez took the role of
Candida with Charito Solis appearing as Paula directed by yet another National Artist, Lino
Brocka.

Thus the burden of creating a 2017 version of this play now transformed into a musical with
book and lyrics by (here we go again) National Artist Rolando Tinio is of the tallest order.
Celeste Legaspi, Girlie Rodis and her team together with Arcenas and Ryan Cayabyab can be
literally personified as the young man carrying his old father on his back as they escape from a
burning city. The burden is the expectations of the public and the weight of the history of this
material to be brought to the screen in the age of social media.
Admittedly, Rodis and company realized that Ang Larawan as a sang-through musical would not
elicit the kind of frenzied response of the Vice Ganda movies. Neither does it have the privilege
of strength of a franchise like Shake, Rattle and Roll.

The director and producers were aware that theirs was an uphill battle, a high brow film
translation of a play that verges on the operatic. How can this possibly compete with the magic
of special effects and the commonness of familiar comedy bar humor? Is there a place for an
intelligent material meant for the literati in a festival meant for the madlang people crowding
malls and queuing for the first showing of their much awaited fantasy flick?
Well, passion knows no logic. It defies warnings and hopefully creates miracles.
This passion is so very evident in Ang Larawan: there was great reverence given to the words of
Tinio so that what we see on screen is an edited version of the book and libretto then shot by
Arcenas. Unlike the first movie version of Portrait, this musical utilized no screenplay as
adaptation... and it showed in the treatment of the material. Neither is there a real musical score
because what we experience is the beautiful music of Ryan Cayabyab as material for the play.
Nonetheless, the power of the musical play is preserved as its sense of history and insistence
on significance. But, as I have written before, there are four reasons why this version of the play
is important: Joaquin, Tinio, Cayabyab and Joanna Ampil. I repeat and cannot emphasize
enough: Joanna Ampil.

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For the past two decades Joanna Ampil has been a theater star, hailed in the West End. She is
one of the handful of of true Filipino international stars whose name is more recognizable
abroad than she is here in her native land. Thus after all these years she landed the role of
Candida Marasigan and rendered a truly remarkable performance. Not only in her singing did
Ampil show incomparable excellence but in the nuances of her acting for the camera for the
very first time.

In a year of very lean notable performances of actresses (include Angeli Bayani in Zig Dulay's
Bagahe and Iza Calzado in Jerrold Tarog's Bliss) , Ampil gives the hands down performance of
the year Ably supported by her Paula, Rachel Alejandro --- and a cast that includes a thespian
like Menchu Lauchengco-Yulo or a veteran theater, television and film actor like Nonie
Buencamino, Ampil and this cast has turned yet another version of Portrait of the Artist as
Filipino as unquestionably significant and important.

Then there is the other entry, the smaller film.

After twelve months of insatiable romcoms with occasional delights (like Bernardo's Kita Kita),
this year's MMFF has a relationship movie that is not overdosing on saccharine, not playing for
cute and dated to be sharp, edgy and down to earth real.
There was almost real pain in watching Derek Ramsay and Jennelyn Mercado in All of You.
The film confined itself to two characters --- Gab and Gabbi --- whose relationship traversed a
volatile arc from a chance meeting using a dating app down through that long and complicated
process of self-discovery and rediscovery.

What makes this Dan Villegas movie special is that it dares to be unapologetic.
There is a very disturbing yet delicious rawness about the imperfection of the lovers. He is ever
self-doubting yet stubborn, bratty yet sincere while she is a passive-aggressive girl who has a
superb talent of inflicting guilt on her lovers as she plays the role of drama queen and victim.
Because of this courage not to romanticize characters into those color-by-number romcom
stereotypes,

All of You is a little gem that may not be for everybody but certainly challenges the audiences to
think while they feel. Defying expectations, this love story is not an anesthesia. It does not
provide a hundred minutes of lovey-dovey fast-tracked by a sugary theme song. Yet this movie
can create kilig moments that are mature, not inane or formulaic. More important than that, they
are real scenes in a couple's life with the audience as voyeur observing the build-up and
deterioration of a relationship.

After English Only Please, Jennelyn Mercado was rediscovered by the audience. Here is one of
the most versatile and competent actresses we have around --- still underrated as she deserves
portrayals as challenging as what she did in this Dan Villegas project.
We may have had our doubts about Derek Ramsay's capacity to embrace roles because we are
more preoccupied with his triceps and abs. Or we may have thought his Best Actor trophy in
English Only ... is a fluke. But this time we are quite sure about what we are getting.

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Ramsay is excellent as Gab and mano-a-mano, he delivers perhaps his best performance ever.
His rendition of Gab as a wounded man trying to put together a life is so familiar, so reachable
that we all know a guy like this sometime or the other in our lives.
The premium offered by All of You is its honesty and its refusal to be brought down to the level
of formula. It boasts not only of first rate performances from its cast but also a screenplay that
stands to be perhaps one of the best for the entire year. For this, the movie is worth celebrating
this December.

Regardless of what we feel or think of the MetroManila Filmfest, it has become so much a part
of the popular cultural tradition of the country. Even if through the years the all-Filipino movie
festival has generated too many questions and controversies, it has still proven to be a viable
source of some of our best cinematic pieces.

And so, another year has come to pass ... and it is not enough we stomp our feet whether in
applause or in protest. What is important is that we go out and watch all these Filipino movies
... both flippant and great, both amusing and intriguing. There is no point screaming our lungs
out saying we want better films if we do not go out of our way to watch them.
For the record, folks: we get the movies we deserve because of those who choose to watch
them in movie houses. Enough said.

On Privilege In Independent Cinema: Every Cloud Has A Silver Spoon Lining

Mara Coson

Philippine cinema has never had a tradition of depicting characters from privileged classes as
protagonists; if they are depicted as such, they are usually placed within the context of subaltern
desire: rich boy meets poor girl and through her, changes for the better. This notion has been
popularized by the romantic comedies of Viva or Star Cinema, which bank on increasing social
mobility and the rising power of “young professionals” who might identify with these narratives.
In these films, we see fresh graduates pining for dashing CEOs; we see knees bending when a
young face steps out of a sleek car. Take, for example, the recent film, The Mistress :
“Tinagalog ko para maintindihan mo , ” says the wife of a philandering businessman, after
berating her husband’s kabit, a sastre played by Bea Alonzo, in the recent Star Cinema film. In
the tradition of forcedly complex mainstream dramas, however, the sastre also transforms the
womanizing businessman’s son, played by John Lloyd Cruz, by making him fall in love with her
and the beauty of her “simplicity.”
Class dynamics have long played a major role in contemporary Philippine cinema, not only in
mainstream romantic comedies, but also in dramas and nationalist cinema.
In Celso Ad Castillo’s Pagputi ng Uwak, Pag-itim ng Tagak , the relationship between a young
“delinquent” named Dido (Bembol Roco) and his rich young lover Julie (Vilma Santos) falls apart
soon after a hasty attempt to elope, and out of heartbreak, Dido responds to Julie’s preferring to
maintain her lifestyle over love by joining Hukbalahap rebels. In Lino Brocka’s Bayan Ko: Kapit
Sa Patalim , we see Turing (Philip Salvador), a factory worker caught in the middle of a worker’s

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strike, who robs—to horrific ends—his employers out of a desperate need to pay for his wife’s
hospital bills.
In this cross-section of Philippine cinema, the distance of the mainstream cinema audience from
the privileged appears to be a reminder that, given their patronage, it is the greater public that
holds the fort in Philippine cinema, and thus it is the greater public that these films speak to.
But what happens when the upper classes begin to incorporate their stories into the Philippine
cinematic canon through independent films made by and for the privileged, which have no
tropes that are recognizable to the masses?
In a country where less than one percent of the population can identify with these narratives,
can plurality exist?
Give up Tomorrow: The Rich Victim
The laurels emerge first in the trailer of Marty Syjuco and Michael Collins’s Give Up Tomorrow ,
a film that gained recognition in over fifty film festivals before it was screened at Cinemalaya last
July.
Give Up Tomorrow tells the story of Paco Larrañaga, the tough-faced mestizo who was the
alleged leader of the group of Cebuano boys accused of murdering the two Chiong sisters in
1997. The documentary asserts Larrañaga’s innocence in what was known as the “Cebu
scandal of the century,” revealing that Larrañaga was in a different city when the murder
happened (as all his classmates witnessed), that the body unearthed wasn’t even the body of a
Chiong sister, that the police witness, Davidson Rucia (who claimed to be part of the gang), was
a stranger to Larrañaga, and other alarming facts, which—to the astonishment of the
audience—the judicial system swept under the rug.
It has thus become the mission of the documentary, and of its filmmakers, who have become
filmmakers solely for this purpose, to free Larrañaga by exposing the weaknesses of the
Philippine judicial system and media.
Mrs. Chiong, the mother of the murdered and also the “villain” in the film, has insisted that
Larrañaga is indeed guilty, and to this day, Larrañaga remains in jail, with this year marking his
fifteenth year in spite of protests and international support following the film.
While its later commercial release in Metro Manila gained some traction, its Cebu screenings
were more difficult to arrange.
Last July, a GMA News TV anchorwoman asked Mrs. Chiong how she felt about a possible
Cebu screening: “ Marami silang gimik. Kaya nila yan kasi may pera sila . . . Pati paggawa ng
dokyumentary, kaya. [They have a lot of gimmicks. They can do that because they have the
money . . . They can even make a documentary.]
Screening in Cebu, according to the filmmakers, was their biggest goal. Only one major
cinema—although it nearly pulled out at the last minute—screened the film in Cebu. But its
screening, uncommon for an independent film, was extended. The general response following
the screening was a distinct realization that nobody is above the law, and that the stereotypes
associated with the “ coño” nearly left Larrañaga guilty as mistakenly charged. “Finally,”
remarked Syjuco, “I feel complete.”
Ang Nawawala: Tragic Youths
Gibson Bonifacio, the protagonist of Ang Nawawala , is a well-off twenty-year-old who comes
home from his studies abroad for the Christmas holidays. Gibson hasn’t spoken in ten years,

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and fills his silence with local music, weed, and imagined discussions with the ghost of his dead
twin. As the film unfolds, we discover why Gibson has been evading the confrontation of
long-seated familial problems, and what it will take to break his silence.
Film critic Rolando Tolentino called Ang Nawawala “ burgis na juvenilia, ” a dismissal based on
the assumption that the greater public cannot have affinity for the middle and upper classes.
Tolentino may have been right, but seeking this affinity does not seem to be the film’s intention.
“Honestly I wanted to make a movie with a good story. Just very simple. And make it something
that is sincere and authentic, not pretending to be something that it’s not—not trying to make a
sweeping statement about life and about class,” claims director Marie Jamora. “Putting [the film]
in any other social class is false.”
While it was extremely popular among pockets of the local music scene, its commercial release
failed to produce the numbers it had hoped for, and the film was nearly pulled out before its run
had ended. There were many things that may have been lost in translation for a mainstream
audience: the stylistic influences of Wes Anderson, the portrayal of “young love” in the context
of an opaque “scene,” and the role of music as a character in the film. But in a sense, the
confused reception was expected. Ang Nawawala is a film written for music and for itself; it is
the director’s homage to her experience, and for this reason the film’s near mainstream failure
hints at its success.
The Animals: The Upper Class Animal
A film often compared to Ang Nawawala in this year’s Cinemalaya because of its portrayal of
upper class youth is Gino M. Santos’ The Animals. The film shuns the notion of a “protagonist”,
opting instead for an almost masochistic free-for-all situation in which upper class kids can
indulgently play victim to their own excesses: parties and drugs with minimal parental
supervision. Of course, as though indebted to the moral teachings of their Catholic private
schools and the love of their parents, the characters rush to a heavily moralized conclusion of
schoolyard schadenfreude.
The Animals engages the more mainstream upper class, making use of easily recognizable
tropes like “wild house parties” with Top-40 DJs, Rohypnol, and other images that appear in
many Hollywood teen films and magazines. The portrayal of this gated inner circle, the way Ang
Nawawala portrayed the inner “indie” circle, is the accomplishment of The Animals as it
successfully shows what private school kids do when given a camera and a curious audience. It
is deliberately unapologetic in the way it reveals the reckless underside of the young upper
class, and for that the film was well-received.
To this date, The Animals has not had a commercial release. This is not a reflection of how far
the film had notgone but rather how far the film had gone with its portrayal of the “spoiled rich
kid.” Since it is a film made for the upper class with social codes that cannot be understood,
having no commercial release hints that the filmmakers are aware of the film’s limits.
The End
From being successful commercially ( Give Up Tomorrow) , to barely succeeding commercially
(Ang Nawawala) , to not going commercial at all (The Animals) , these three films offer a rare
image of the privileged as they see themselves.
In his review of The Animals, Ronaldo Tolentino hints that portraying privilege in cinema might
be a desperate trend tolerated by an independent cinema in creative limbo:

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Matapos ng pagtungo sa mga subalternong karakter, rehiyonal na subalternong karakter,
ngayon naman ay tumutungo na ang mundo ng indie cinema sa isa pang subalterno: ang
aktwal na napakaliit na bilang ng maykaya sa lipunang Filipino— ang mayayaman .”
[Tr.: After we’ve reached the subaltern character, regional subaltern characters, now the world
of independent cinema is headed towards another subaltern: the small number of people who
can afford life in the Philippines: the rich.]
With local cinema being made for and supported by the greater public, it is indeed difficult for
films made for and by the privileged to assert their status as more than just a passing trend, as
more than an intermission from poverty porn, or a momentary intrusion into the already small
space where the purported “singularity” of the Philippine experience exists—especially in the
subsphere of “independent” cinema. But what these three films suggest is that their existence is
possible.

Burgis na juvenilia

Ayon kay Bienvenido Lumbera, hurado ng Cinemalaya 2012, ang isang tampok sa mga lahok
ay ang pagtalakay ng isa na namang aspekto ng buhay sa lipunang Filipino: ang nakakataas na
uri’t maykaya. Hindi ko alam kung good news bad news ito. Pero ang tiyak, unapologetic na
agad ang ganitong pelikula.
Walang self-reflexive gesture o take sa pagiging mayaman at pribilehiyado ang Ang Nawawala ,
paukol sa isang kabataang lalake na nagkakandakumahog sa pagbaybay sa trauma ng
kamusmusang pagsaksi sa pagkamatay ng kakambal, at ng kontak sa unang true love. Dahil sa
trauma, nagdesisyon itong hindi magsalita, at sa kanyang isip, kinakausap pa rin niya ang
kakambal.
Nagbiyahe ito sa ibang bansa. Kumukonsulta sa doktor, kumukuha ng videos ng kanyang
paglalakbay. Isang pasko sa kanyang pagbabalik, natagpuan niyang higit na nagkakahiwalay
ang kanyang mga magulang, higit na naninigaw sa katiwala ang kanyang ate, mas malibog ang
kanyang best friend, at maganda ang umibig. Sa katunayan, kilig ang audience, karamihan ay
kabataang natutumbok ng pelikula.
Samantalang kami ng kasama kong kaguro ay bagot na bagot sa MTV moments, na sa sobrang
dami ng kantang gustong mailagay sa CD version ay maraming eksena na nakikinig sa concert
ang may hindi isa o dalawang kanta, kundi tatlo. At ang tanging aksyon dito ay mula sa
pakikinig tungo sa head nodding at pagsayaw nang nahihiya hanggang sa wala nang hiya.
Nandito ang romantikong fantasya ng kabataan: may hitsura, maykaya, may dress up, may alter
ego, may pag-ibig, may nawalang pag-ibig, may alaala ng tunay na pag-ibig, may nawawala
pero parating may natitira para ipaalaala ang kawalan. Kalakhan ng angst sa pelikula ay paukol
sa fantasya ng pagiging maykaya sa bansa: ganito (lang) ang kanilang problema, at ganito
(lang) ang kanilang coping at making do mechanism.
Hindi sa minamaliit ang ganitong uri. Pero ang napagtagumpayan ng
Ang Nawawala ay gawing labis na sinematiko—larger than life, film worthy, film grant
worthy—ang buhay ng pribilehiyadong maykaya sa bansa. Purong pabalat at artifice—purong
imahen—ang pelikula: dinadaan sa close-up, nguyngoy shot, slow motion, repetisyon, high
fives, at reiteratibo ang justifikasyon para sa uring tinatalakay. Pero hanggang imahen lang,

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walang substansya maliban sa transformasyon ng elitistang buhay bilang kanasa-nasa sa mas
higit na mayoryang umaasam lang ng ganitong buhay.
May ipinapanganak na problematiko ang ganitong pagtahak ng buhay ng maykaya, lalo pa
bilang binary oposisyon sa pangkahalatang tema ng indie cinema, ang abang uri. Kung sa huli
ay napakabigat ng pagdanas sa subalternong kahirapan at paghihirap, sa una ay relatibong
magaan at iilang individual ang dumaranas nito. Kaya higit na nakakapanghalina ang buhay ng
maykaya kaysa sa mahihirap kung tutuusin.
Kahit pa sa pagtatapos ng pelikula, neorealistiko ang tinahak din na landas ng Ang Nawawala :
na uusad lang ang buhay, magpapatuloy ang paglalakbay ng lalake para hanapin muli ang
kanyang sarili. Dahil kahit na nakumpronta na niya ang kanyang multo, pati ang labi ng
naunsyaming tunay na pag-ibig, hindi pa rin matutumbasan ang batayang kawalan.
Ang resulta nito sa manonood, pangunahing intelektwal at aspirasyonal na gitnang uri sa hanay
ng indie cinema, ay itransforma ang makauring isyu sa antas ng metapisika: na individual na
pagkatao at kolektibong humanidad—partikular sa pagdanas ng kalungkutan, pangungulila,
pag-iisa—ang nagbibigkis sa ating lahat. Anong ganda ng buhay?!
Walang guilt sa mundo ng labis ng pribilehiyadong uri, na hindi masasabi sa poverty films ng
indie cinema. Dawit (implicated) tayong manonood sa poverty films: sa distansyasyon ng
wanna-be na gitnang uring manonood sa realidad ng pelikula, walang identifikasyon ang
nabububo na lumilikha ng kritikal na obhetibidad para pag-isipan ang relasyon ng sarili sa
tinatalakay na mundo.
Sa pelikula hinggil sa maykaya, ang kritikal na distansya ay nawawala, na tulad sa Hollywood
films, nilalamon para ang sarili ay magkaroon ng (mis)rekognisyon na ito rin ang kanyang
mundo, ito ang gusto niyang maging mundo, at ipagkanulo ang sariling mundo. Ito ang
reafirmasyon ng komersyal na media at kulturang popular ng kapitalismo.
Sa aking palagay, walang tunay na independent na pananaw ito sa isang iniluwal ng “indie
cinema.” Napapanahon na rin sigurong ibuyanyang kung tunay nga bang independent ang
namamayagpag na indie cinema sa kasalukuyan.

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