DAY 11 ; ECQ

The eleventh day.  Not yet talking to plants and hearing them answer you back.  My dog has started to shy away from me: I think she is beginning to feel I am harassing her. I guess it is just too much company from her human.

And I was content listening to the Motown sound of my youth while trying to create the semblance of a workout in the mornings.

I was determined to have a relatively quiet day writing until this whole thing about the senator blew right out of the platforms of social media.

More deadly than the virus is the toxic response of netizens to the politicos.  Not that the philosophers and the fools are doing anything that they haven't been doing for the past too many years, but there is a difference when the general population is on self-house arrest.  Bluntly put: all eyes are on the computer monitors and the smartphones.  

Everyone is being updated by Twitter, bedazzled by Instagram stories and Facebook Live.  There are also such a great number doing their own versions of Tik Tok so much so that the platform was so overwhelmed to donate a sizable amount to various charitable causes.

For every Vico Sotto, Marcy Teodoro, Ishko Moreno or even that 23 year old mayor from Alaminos, Pangasinan --- Arth Bryan Celeste --- there is this, uh, menagerie of politicians who have quite succeeded in turning this Coronavirus season into the early ritual of self-crucifixion.

These include:

(a) Blundering politicians who just cannot do anything right in front or behind the eye of the public so much so that every move they make seems to dig a deeper and deeper grave for the future aspirations in governance.

(b)Local unit officials who took the directive of self-quarantine too seriously that they decided to migrate to a completely different dimension, leaving their constituents to fend for themselves and use the proper of faith and prayer for survival. In other words, they have practiced the art of "creative disappearance" so that their presence has ceased from even being virtual.  They have turned completely invisible ... for the sake of their health.

(c) Men and women of privilege who used their position, clout, influence, family name --- or even affiliation to the sanitation officers of the Palace --- to get ahead of everybody.  There is nothing new about this either: My Golly naman ...dis is da Pilipins. It is already integral in Philippine culture raw to practice the art of palakasan, singilan ng utang na loob at pakikisama. So if the politicians get to be ahead of the line in the COVid19 testing, it is only because it is their Divine Right, di ba?  As my Lola would put it, Por que estamos en poder?

Cabin fever apparently shortens the patience of people and netizens have become more unforgiving. Or maybe because people have just had it, so that now in critical times --- when uncertainty clouds every decision to be made --- when even going out to buy sitaw in the grocery can be a question of life or death  (that, of course, is an over dramatizing), then you just can't invest that much tolerance for ngitngit lines like:

(a) "Pasensiya na po. Tao lang."
(b) "Para yon lang?"
(c) "Kilala mo ba kung sino ako? Eh, sino ka ba?"
or the worst of them all ...
(d) "Eh, di wow ..."

You cannot take that especially from people you have elected into office, get their jollies from the taxes that you pay ... then suddenly treat their constituents like they owe them a favor. Not in such terrible times like these ... when people want to be assured, to be led, to be given guidance as to what is best to do next, they do a Houdini act, evaporating from the heart of the problem and perhaps condensing when all this over, celebrating their imaginary leadership.

I had my share of laughs looking at the memes and the videos of mayors being ganged up by netizens.  I had my fill of the speed and genius of the Filipino as humorists when they concoct memes in a record ten minutes flat.  Suddenly posted, then shared, infesting the worldwide net in its spectrum of platforms ... faster than the Coronavirus.

But some things are ANYTHING but funny.

Like the stunt that this senator did. 

I am still trying to figure out what could have been running in his head when he actually went to the hospital to accompany his wife who is about to have give birth via C-Section.

The senator was already symptomatic, having been tested for the virus a few days earlier.  He was very well aware that he needed to be in house quarantine and that in the event that he is identified as virus-positive, then he would be infecting not only the doctors and nurses in the hospital ... but also the other patients, their chaperones and other individuals who may be in his area regardless of number or density.

Was it not the President himself who insisted that everyone stay home, practice personal discretion and discipline in order to defeat the infection?  Was it not the message from Malacanang that night when all this was happening and all the while there was a member of the Upper House breaking the protocol and endangering the lives of the frontliners?

To put this bluntly: the scenario has turned surreal.

More than the virus ... or maybe after the virus, I worry about the aftermath.

The aftermath in terms of economics.  The aftermath in terms of what will be left of the world after it goes on a freeze mode for weeks ... hopefully not months.  The aftermath in terms of the damage that has been created in the moral fabric of governance has been so defined. Because critical times like these show the stuff that people are made of ... and where the best and worst in people are displayed in public so blatantly and even shamelessly.

DAY 10: ECQ

Last night, with the hope of amusement, I ended up terrorizing myself before I went to bed.

I watched the movie CONTAGION, starring Jude Law, Kate Winslet, Laurence Fishburne, Marion Cotillard, Matt Damon and Gwyneth Paltrow to frighten myself into utmost restlessness.  I have already seen this film of Steven Soderbergh years ago.  

When I watched this movie nine years ago, it was a curious experience: a virus outbreak coming out of chance because (spoiler alert) a displaced bat provided material for a hungry piglet to eat resulting to a mutant product that was transferred to humans.  \

Why?  Because somebody did not wash his hands.  Well, for the record, Patient 1 contracted her sickness from Macau ... not Wuhan. 

I have been "terrorized" by similar tropes in all these zombie and dystopian movies and tv shows of late, from WORLD WAR Z to TRAIN TO BUSAN.  And if you have read Stephen King's phone book thick novel about Armageddon entitled THE STAND, then you would have identified "the flu" as the culprit to end a substantial population of the planet earth for the final battle between Good and Evil to take place.

Bill Gates talked about this in his TED TALKS five years ago but nobody listened.  Or took it all too seriously.

We were still stuck to the idea that nuclear weapons will decimate a substantial population of the earth --- so we had our eyes on all these Big Bosses running Powerful Nations play their Game of Thrones.  Gates was right: the artillery did not involve guided or long distance missiles.  The game changer were microbes.

The resolutions in movies about biological tragedies come handy.  Somewhere along the line, the heroes win ... the martyrs are honored, bravery is celebrated.  Just like in real life.  Yet real life is not like movies.  The answers do not come conveniently and convincingly in Act III when the story reaches its end and the conclusion is reached, the lesson illustrated.

Vaccines are not discovered, tested and developed within the span of one hundred minutes running time of a full length feature.  They take much, much longer ... involving the loss of more lives by the day.

Real life is belonging to the "present progressive"--- when each morning you wake up, realizing that it will be more of the same day in house arrest because of the Enhanced Community Quarantine implemented by the government.  

Where I live there is a "total lock down" added to the fact that the city has decided to go on a twenty-four hour curfew. That is a euphemism for a "really, really total lock down." Which means I cannot even walk my dog or simply move elsewhere to another location to change the scenery. Never in my so many years of human existence have I felt so helpless ... and useless.

Yes, maybe I can use the time to read the books I bought, write the scripts I have always wanted to write ... or even go back drawing, using the tomes of coloring books I have purchased with the pencils, ballpoint pens.  I try to understand why I cannot focus ... but that does not take much thought to decipher.

At this point, there is no certainty. I no longer know what to expect. 

Not only are we not sure if the 12 April deadline will truly find us free from our quarantine ... but the point of the matter is that as I write this, the epidemic has not peaked in the country.

We do not know if we are oh so lucky to only run third in the region behind Thailand and Indonesia with a little over five hundred confirmed cases and not (yet)forty casualties.  But we are not sure if these are the real numbers because there is no mass testing being done. Yet.  We hope it remains that way ... and that we do not surge in number like what is happening in key cities found in other countries.

We can never be sure when this will be over.  

We do not know what kind of world to expect when this pandemic settles down and becomes part of our traumatic collective memory.

There are too many lessons being taught ... and we are not sure either if people are getting the message about the people they have chosen to put into power, what they are doing ... and what could have been done.  Better yet, we ... no, I ... can only pray that people do see beyond speeches, gimmickry and popularity the next time they install someone in a position of power and responsibility.

Amidst the uncertainty, there are heroes being created.  There are natural born leaders being identified.

There are also the scumbags, douche bags, imbeciles, cretins and banshees who are as toxic as the NCov19 and who we hope through the wisdom if not the anger of the people can eradicated the next time the Filipinos go to the polls.

In the meantime, let us focus on the here and now.  There are no convenient short cut conclusions to the narrative that the NCov19 is creating.  It is a constant unfolding ... and heartbreak.

Unlike CONTAGION or even TRAIN TO BUSAN, real life has no closing credits.   Just the next chapter called the following day. And clinging onto the ship of life with a rope called hope.

DAY 9: ECQ

No, I am not yet scaling the walls of my home ... but I am just about to.

Each time I have the compulsion to do so, I whistle a happy tune.

I do not want to think of the following:

(1) The number of health care workers who have sacrificed their lives to care for the sick.  Yes, it is a great part of their calling.  As doctors, nurses and medical assistants, they swore to their duties to tend to the sick down to the very end.  It is heartbreaking when you hear that it is those who cure who meet their end as heroes.

Yes, they are heroes of 2020.  

There is anesthesiologist who left messages when he realized that he was so badly infected that the inevitable was around the corner.  He left word to friends to watch over his wife --- another medico --- and his son who he would leave behind.  Reading his final words before his passing was devastating --- as it never carried an ounce of regret but instead held onto the responsibility that he vowed to fulfill over and above his personal concerns and interests.

That is a hero.

Then there was the thirty-four year old doctor who literally rose from the ranks.  He finished his medical degree through hard work and scholarships, a breadwinner of his family, the beacon of hope.  This young doctor's life was cut short because one of his patients lied: she did not give an honest account of her medical history, denying vital information that could have pointed to her being exposed to those positive of the virus.

He is another hero.

As there are so many other unnamed doctors and nurses who have also been exposed to the virus and have become PUMs as well, some even in Intensive Care Units after tending the sick, the needy.  Their names need not be enumerated by the medical community is very well aware of who they are and the sacrifice they have gone through to insure that the virus should find containment.

They are all heroes.  And they break my heart.


(2) The suffering that the everyday wage earner is going through now ... and the indefinitely long haul it would take before the lifting of the community quarantine remains unfathomable.

Yes, it is inevitable.  We will still be locked down in our homes past the deadline given by the government not unless there is visible success in "flattening the curve"or a cure is found to eradicate the NCOV19.  Otherwise, the semblance of our normal lives will not be resurrected on Easter Sunday 2020.

There is almost blinded optimism in that ... but I will keep on hoping. And praying.

This is a Catch-22 situation.  People need to stay put so as not to spread the virus: that is the rationale for the buzzwords of the year, "social distancing".  

But people MUST leave their homes to find work, buy food and medicine and brave their daily existence.  The choice is between suffering at home penniless and spared of the virus ... or exposing yourself to the dangers in the streets outside, desperately trying to comply with the protocol.  There is no easy resolution to the dilemma.

The solution should come elsewhere --- by addressing the needs of those who depend on day to day work not only for their sustenance but also their survival.  This is where the national and local government should come in to take care of its citizenry.  At this point we need clear cut plans, blueprints of alternatives and solutions to provide for those disenfranchised by the lockdown. 

We do not need promises, rhetoric or pictorials of politicians announcing to social media that they have stepped out of their homes (parang mga doktor lang raw ang peg) to keep us safe.  Uhm, just a short comment here: that just happens to be THEIR jobs so we don't owe them for that. 

The bigger problem is what lies ahead.

(3) It is as if everything in the world has frozen.  Like an image that has become immobile, lifeless, non-functional on your monitor: in computer terms --- the world hanged.

No economic activity. No productivity. Nothing.

People are forced for their own good to stay in the safety of their homes, rendered helpless to the toxicity of the microbe, under various rules and regulations to curb their activities.   

So what happens next?   The repercussions are unimaginable: business came to a half but people still need to be paid.  People stopped buying non-essentials so there is a spectrum of industries and services which are running on empty for as long as the lockdown continues.  Human needs continue ... but work has stopped.  And for some, work will be gone by the time attempts are made to return to normal.

This leads me to the most dreaded question spinning in my mind.

(4) When will this end?  

Hope that the quarantine will be lifted right after the Lenten Season has become all the more vague.  As the test kits have revealed, more and more cases are arising.  As some of our countrymen do not take the practice of social distancing seriously, the retardation of the contamination rate will take a much longer amount of time than what is projected.  We are back into that Catch-22 situation that worsens the scenario.

I woke up this morning with one of my social media friends starting a discussion as when friends suspected the quarantine will be lifted.  If scientific calculations are to be taken seriously, then the eighteen month projection is ... apocalyptic, to say the least. The very thought of the world on freeze mode for even three months us enough to give one nightmares ... while being a hundred percent awake.

The virus is killing people ... but its aftermath can be the much greater horror.  We do not know the shape of the world and the remnants of its systems when all this comes to an end.

I only wish I can flash forward and look back at the events of the first quarter of 2020 and realize that we have all survived this ... and that history is a menu of lessons to be learned.

But as we live through the present progressive, as we slowly watch the unfolding of events through the wringer, we can only hope for the best.  

I do not want to drown in my pool of paranoia and feast on a diet of worries.

Neither can I escape the fact that his might as well be World War III.

DAY 8: ECQ

I find myself going back to my blog after a long period of lethargy.  Or lack of time and focus.

I excused myself for making myself too busy to be busy.

But the quarantine is now on its eighth day.  

I have been under a self-imposed house arrest since Monday afternoon. Then I thought I was on the verge of incurable boredom that I went to the gym, posted a photo in Instagram and Facebook --- that sent havoc to the universe of my friends in those social media platforms.  All were begging me to go home, telling me that I was making a fatal mistake to worry about my abs and cardio exercises over the dangers of the virus.

I belong to that age group quite vulnerable to the virus. So there was valid concern that I was mistaking myself to be an invincible mutant.

There was practically nobody in the gym at that time.  Maybe about eight of us excluding the trainers who were in greater number than the clients  So after an hour I went home and did some groceries.

And that was my most recent glimpse of civilization.

For a time, saddled by my schedule, I had wished for a few days off.  

I wanted a respite from school and film work so that I can just loll in bed and watch another Koreanovela in Netflix or probably finish the pile of books I bought from last month's Big Bad Wolf Book Sale. I only wanted a few days  ... but I never asked for a month. 

Out of my sheer craving for the sanctuary of my house, now I am cringing ... out of a restless need to see the outside world. I give myself three more days and I will be climbing walls.  Or going up the roof.

What is happening is necessary if not inevitable. The lock down is the only viable solution ... at this point of the game.

We could have done something earlier to avoid if not prepare for our Patient 1 but we did not. But that is the subject of a completely different essay which I do not intend to write about.

We were not prepared.  We thought it was bad when we watched the videos of the empty streets of locked down Wuhan.  We did not realize that it was going to be this bad the first time we heard of a tourist who was confirmed positive and went around the Visayas then Manila for a vacation.  We were a little bit more alarmed that a Filipino with NCov19 was finally spotted  --- and he went around the Greenhills Shopping Center while asymptomatic.

That commercial hub in Greenhills was locked down for disinfection and it only took a week before the exponential growth of the  infected warranted a "community quarantine"of Metro Manila by the weekend.  But worse, about two days later, the whole island of Luzon went on a complete lock down.

I have lived through the most interesting years of Martial Law.  Most of my college years ... and many more after were guided by the law of curfew hours.  It was midnight to four in the morning then but because this is a health emergency, the curfew hours now stretch from eight in the evening to five in the morning.  (The City of Muntinlupa went beyond that and announced a 24 hour curfew since the 20th of March.)

Movement is now restricted. At my age I cannot even get a quarantine pass because I am a senior citizen and should be restricted to the perimeter of the home. So much for going back to the gym ... or the grocery.  But we can if we must although it will again bring havoc to that subset of friends who are threatening to chain me to my bed in order to make me behave according to the dictates of the DOH.

But then the health scare is only the first layer of worries.

The blessing and bane of social media are that you get far too much information.  Both true and false.  And sometimes you cannot tell one from the other because your mind feels like it has been placed inside a blender with all the information twirling so many spins a millisecond.  

During the Martial Law years there was great fear ... but not as much fear as it is now because of the constant flow and bombardment of information coming from social media platforms, your cellphones and your friends who are all insisting to meet up at Zoom or Facebook Messenger in order to amuse or scare each other.

Now there is a paranoia of being informed while being uninformed or misinformed.  You no longer have the time to be discerning and just let everything go through that mental blender all over again, sputtering an opinion or two when asked.

Now Day 8 is ending.  And if feels more than a week.

A lesson is being taught here.  I am still a believer that nothing happens by accident and that everything that transpires in life must have a reason and provide a learning.  When you do not comprehend or accept the lesson, then everything proves futile and useless.  

I believe the lessons are very, very clear in what we --- and that means the whole world --- is going through right now. We all screwed it up as individuals and as inhabitants of a benevolent planet and now it is payback time.

We needed to slapped silly.  More important, we are being commanded to STOP.  Only when we STOPPED did we see. Only when we are forced to keep still because other people became the danger did we begin to hear.  The problem was that ... is that ... we have conditioned our daily lives based on our Google calendars.  

We have defined our existence by appointments, achievements and accumulations so much so that stripped off them we are stupefied.

When we wake up each morning for a week realizing that we cannot go out and our movements are limited, we do not have work, we have no deadlines to fulfill ... then we are confronted by a completely different routine.  We wake up, we eat, we do whatever, we eat, we watch TV, or read ... then sleep to do more or less the same thing all over again.

And this has only been going on for a week!

I promised myself that I will be productive and write three screenplays by Easter Sunday when all this is lifted.

I promised myself I will finish at least four to five novels of guilty pleasure (nothing intellectual, nothing to debate about in posh cafes and post-dinner conversations.

I promised myself I will go back to drawing --- considering how I have lost that hobby and yet accumulated so many sketching materials which I have not used.

I promised myself that I will not feel miserable that all our Easter plans with my nephews are cancelled ... and what I am going through right now is like an extended Holy Week minus the rituals and sacraments.

But then again ...

I cannot find the motivation to write a screenplay because I am not sure when the next production meeting will take place ... if at all after we survey the debris that this juggernaut will leave in the movie industry.

I cannot sit down and read because the silence is killing me with all these nervous thoughts about when this is going to end ... and what it will take to make it end, how it will end and what is the end? 

I cannot even lift a pencil to go back to my coloring books.

I am still trying to figure out if this is what has been predicted by all the soothsayers, all the banshees, all the clairvoyants about the great purge.

I can look very hard at the positive side of all this --- and finally ACCEPT the lesson that is being taught.  That we brought this upon ourselves.  That it is not only that particular bat and pangolin who caused the migration of NCov19 to humans.  

That it is about irresponsibility and recklessness and failure to heed our crimes against nature that has brought about this moment.   

Who would have thought that what started in a wet market in Wuhan would create such havoc to literally paralyze the world?  Who would have imagined the extent of damage this has created in terms of human lives and worse ... an impending economic meltdown?

There seems to be nothing positive about that ... but there is.

We are finally made to realize that we are not invincible, no amount of  nuclear power gives bragging rights to the most powerful nations because they too are vulnerable.  What could put us down is what Bill Gates was talking about five years ago: microbes.  

OK. Day 8 is coming to a close and the enormity and graveness of the problem are becoming clearer by the day. This is only a fourth of the journey assuming the quarantine will be lifted on Easter Sunday.  But that all depends ... on us.  And if ever it will be extended, it will also be because of us.

As each day of worldwide paralysis takes place, the deeper we fall into this quagmire of confusion and insecurity. And in these depths, we realize how big a lesson this is to learn.

Onward to Day 9.

CHILDREN AND WOMEN FIRST: THE HARVEST OF CINEMALAYA 2019

CINEMALAYA's 2019 edition will come to an end on Sunday, the 12th of August. This year's crop of independent films reveal homogeneity as well as diversity in themes analyzed, techniques approached --- but more so, products sent on display.

As part of the the Selection Committee of this festival (an honor that I have treasured for the past so many years), one very noteworthy learning affirms that "the screenplay is NOT the film."

More often than not, outstanding screenplays demand attention on the printed page but emerge as completely different animals once they are brought to life and projected on the big screen. 

Some sparkle, delightfully surprise and warrant awe to the filmmaker whose creative gifts have brought magic to what was once mere words.  

Others disappoint, become tragic letdowns as I try to find reasons why the projects undeniably failed.  They looked so promising as text but end up as just that ... unfulfilled promises.

But regardless of the seeming pattern of the annual ritual of reading more than a hundred screenplays followed by interviewing the filmmakers to find out their vision or even their capacity to direct and produce films, the excitement is still in tasting the pudding.

This year's CINEMALAYA is no exception for despite the opinions of many regarding the proportion of good to barely watchable entries, there are (and will always be) gems that herald the birth of the new Filipino filmmakers.  There will be new talents who will shock the audiences who mutter, "Where have they been hiding all this time?"

I shall focus on two films which I believe are the very reasons why CINEMALAYA has become a significant annual event in the cinematic evolution of our country.

Two prevalent themes emerge from the ten feature films in competition in CINEMALAYA 2019: the dilemma and aspirations of lost youth ("EDWARD","JOHN DENVER TRENDING", "F---BOIS", "CHILDREN OF THE RIVER", "ANI") and the empowerment/exploitation of women ("BELLE DOULEUR", 'PANDANGGO SA HUKAY", 'ISKA", "MALAMAYA"). Then there is the search for truth ("TABON").

From these, two films emerge as the unanimous choices--- both popular and critical --- as the best of the crop.

Even from a screenplay level, "JOHN DENVER TRENDING" caught the eye of the Selection Committee for its timeliness, rawness, honesty ... but more so (as much as I hate to use this much-abused word) relevance to the social atmosphere of the time. 
Definitely derivative of recent events where a single video uploaded in the world wide web with malicious intent creates havoc to the lives not only of the victim but of his loved ones and the community, JOHN DENVER is an unforgiving film.  It is difficult to watch because of its uncompromising honesty.  And its ending is disturbing.  And that in itself is an understatement.

The rustic quietness of small town provincial life in Antique,robed with the dialect of locals and the use of non-actors (except for the magnificent Meryll Soriano, my choice as the festival's Best Actress )create a texture and flavor that is disturbingly quiet and yet painfully chaotic.  

When a young boy is ganged upon by his schoolmates, accused of stealing an iPad and captured on video beating up his accuser, his small world is turned upside down.  In a scandal and news hungry universe of the web, a helpless provincial boy and his Tiger Mother are rendered helpless against the deluge of unfounded public opinion and lies, lies and more lies. Suddenly John Denver is no longer a small town boy with small town problems: he is an internet sensation, the personification of a delinquent demon.

There is no question that there are two treasure finds of the year in JOHN DENVER TRENDING. These are the filmmaker Arden Rod Condez and the title character Jansen Magpusao.  It is showcasing the work of Condez that defines CINEMALAYA in discovering fresh talents with  definite and definitive voices, emerging from the woodwork to announce to the world that there is a new Filipino filmmaker with something to say in a manner that he has chosen to say it.  There is this fresh actor, oozing with talent and sincerity --- and who is capable of captivating the audiences beyond being simply pa-cute or pandering to fans.

It seems that it is the newbies in acting who have stolen the thunder in this year's CINEMALAYA.

Aside from Jansen Magpusao, there is Louise Abuel and Elijah Canlas in EDWARD as well as Cocoy de Santos and Royce Cabrera as the controversial F---BOIS. There is even a rediscovery of Ella Cruz (who is better known for her twerking at the snap of a finger) as an actress in Thop Nazareno's movie.

If there is anything that buoyed the theme of loneliness, self-searching and coming-of-age, it is Louise Abuel's painfully beautiful and sincere portrayal of the title role. Like JOHN DENVER, Abuel's face is the film itself, a map of confusion, pain and sadness, dealing with odds far greater than his young mind can handle.

Isolated in a charity ward of a hospital tending to his ailing father (again wonderfully portrayed by Dido de la Paz) and creating a childishly insane bond with a fellow caretaker of a patient portrayed by Elijah Canlas, EDWARD is a glimpse into the loneliest days in the life of a dysfunctional young man trying to find love and meaning and simply growing up.

Over and above this, we put him in the context of charity wards in overcrowded hospitals --- where the living and the dying are lumped together, reminding all of us of the bleak side of mortality. EDWARD, like JOHN DENVER, is painful to watch ... but you cannot take your eyes off the journey of this young man knowing that his is a life in desperate need of promise.

We have never taken Ella Cruz seriously in all the juvenile roles she has portrayed in ... well, all the juvenile movies she has worked on. But as the damaged light of hope and love in Nazareno's EDWARD, she has proven that there is more to her than her pelvic gyrations done as dance moves she was required to do.  

As I have said in a shoutout, CINEMALAYA 2019 has two names --- these are EDWARD and JOHN DENVER. If only for these two films, it was worth braving the rains and traffic to go to the Cultural Center of the Philippines and immerse one's self in the crowds celebrating the inexplicable joy of making and loving movies.

Congratulations, Thops and Arden. You have made two significant films to make this a most exciting and  fruitful year.  With Magpusao and Abuel, we realize that we have discovered two actors --- not mere stars --- but actors who can give life and gravitas to more Filipino films to come.

HIS SONG AND THE STORY OF ROCKETMAN

I should have known better.  I have a habit of watching movies alone.  There are some movie shows that you must not and cannot see all by your sweet self.  You do not want to be cringing and screaming by your sweet self in a suspense or horror film like A Quiet Place. Nor do you burst out into uncontrollable laughter in comedic highlights, right?

But nobody prepared me for Rocketman, a retelling of the life of singer and pop icon Elton John through the thread of his most memorable songs.  Yes, friends already told me that the film was good --- better than that Freddy Mercury bioflick --- but then I always felt they were biased.  Belonging to the High School Class of 1972, our youthful memories are all stuffed with the songs of Elton John together with Crosby, Stills, Nash and Young, Carole King, Carly Simon and, uh, Jim Morrison and Carlos Santana.

Yet all these givens in my life should have been a telltale sign of how I was going to react to his film, seated alone on D-16 Cinema 4, inside a movie house where less than 30% of the seats were occupied. OK, right.  The kids of nowadays may have never heard of Elton John or his music. Generations have their own preferences and benchmarks and maybe the lyrics of Bernie Taupin and the melodies of Elton did not come across to them as relevant to their tastes and mindsets.  But still.

What I did not know was that this was a musical.

No, it is not your usual cut-and-paste jukebox musical featuring all the famous songs of a group threaded together to make a story.  Not Rocketman that used the songs of an artist to narrate the highlights and lowest points of his life, to illustrate his relationship with family, friends and colleagues ... and to blueprint that arc of his rise and fall and resurrection.  

And because these songs are the songs of my youth --- the memories of my high school and college days --- I was this pathetic piece of sponge absorbing everything and by the time Your Song was played to illustrate how this classic was reimagined in its creation, I found tears uncontrollably streaming down my face under the comfortable darkness of a cinema.  

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-uij9eiwwG0


This was not merely a movie for me but an experience. It was a unique experience of understanding a man in his music without the sanitation and safety nets found in the Freddy Mercury biography.  Here was a barenaked look at a life of an artist, a composer and his relationship with his lyricist --- and the price he had to pay for his fame as well as the pain he had to go through to be able to create his art.

My friends who saw the film earlier were right.  This was not only about our generation --- but a beautifully crafted depiction of the making of an idol and his musical creations.

When the movie ended and the lights went on, I realized that fifteen minutes into the film I was not seeing a Welsh actor named Taron Egerton but Elton John.  The man was not lipsyncing original recordings ... but doing his own singing. It was even shocking for me to find out that that familiar face I could not categorically identify was Bryce Dallas Howard as Elton's mother.  

OK, enough said.  This afternoon, alone in the cinema, I must have watched what could be my best film for the year. And I wish that this film directed by Dexter Fletcher receives not only the accolades but also the audience that it so deserves.

Excuse me, but I am putting on my headset and listening to Your Song for the umpteenth time.

THE LAST OF THE TRUE KINGS

In one of his more recent interviews, Eddie Garcia said that when you die, then it is the end.

You will disappear then you will eventually be forgotten.

I dare say that he was wrong.

That was the Eddie Garcia we all knew and gave the highest respect.  Through the span of seven decades of film work, his feet never left the ground although his love for the art and craft enabled him to soar in uncharted bounds of the heavens.

Unlike other "stars" who gave such brilliance for the limited moment they are allowed to float in that imaginary infinity.  If there was one thing that Eddie Garcia proved, then it was his longevity in his career because of his professionalism and ability to adapt, embrace and reinvent himself with the roles he portrayed through the passage of generations.

From Siete Infantes de Lara which ushered in his career as an actor to ML and Rainbow Sunset, Garcia showed no fear, did not cower to the demands of image that actors of lesser talent are obsessed with in the choices of roles or how they presented themselves to the public.  What made Garcia resilient through the ages was the fact that he was an actor, an artist and not merely a celebrity whose concern is public perception rather than personal fulfillment.

I only had one chance to work with Eddie Garcia: that was a project called I Want to Be Happy where he appeared with Gloria Romero, Marissa Delgado, Cherry Pie Picache among others.  And what I remember the most about the Man was that he would be on the set ahead of everybody else, prepared for the day's shoot and would show utmost respect for literally everybody on the set.

This was the measure of greatness.  It was his humility, his accessibility and openness to people he worked with making everyone feel that he was one of them.

Joel Lamangan and I were discussing about the events that transpired leading to the accident that eventually took Garcia away from us.

Joel said that Eddie was like that: he was 90 years old but never used his age as an excuse or a license or a form of entitlement for him to fulfill his work.  He will insist on doing what was demanded by the role because it was part and parcel of what was expected from him as an actor.  He wore that jacket under the sweltering heat of the June midday sun: he complied with the instructions for him to run carrying a gun --- never complaining nor asking to be treated any differently.

He would always say that yes, he was old ... but he was not an invalid

And you do not find people like that any more in the business.  You do not find such commitment and dedication to work as that found in the actors of previous generations.  These are the living treasures of Filipino cinema:  Anita Linda, Gloria Romero, Gloria Sevilla. They are the last of the immortals in a business of dispensable.

We will miss Eddie Garcia.  He is now with Fernando Poe Jr and Dolphy ...the great icons of Filipino cinema who shaped the industry as we understand it today.

We will miss the man. We will miss this Ultimate Gentleman.  We will miss this Great Artist.

Tomorrow, the 24th of June 2019, his ashes will be laid to its final rest. 

But, Sir ... Tito Eddie, you are wrong.

You will never be forgotten. Kings are etched in the annals of history.  They are remembered to give dignity and pride to those they leave behind.

Paalam po.