Film Review: The man called "Heneral Articulo Uno"

Sipping piping-hot native chocolate, a friend in Cebu mentioned not having watched “Heneral Luna”, a Filipino film which has recently been much-praised and much-touted in the Philippine film industry and by fellow-Filipinos. I expressed curiosity and made arrangements to accompany my friend the following day. I also managed to bring my mom along even if she is not overly fond of Filipino films. I told the latter we would be seeing some “bigote” (mustache) action. Hehe!

I cannot remember when I veered away from historical dramas and biographies. It has been ages since I’ve sat down in a movie theater or in front of the idiot box to see any Filipino or Tagalog films or television series.

The quality of the plethora of Philippine movies advertised in the yearly film festivals, as well as the heap of soap operas dished out with no discrimination on our TV screens - such “entertainment” to me, was at best, only a momentary distraction from the nitty-gritty of real life and far too bland as a mishmash of whatever the producers, writers or directors could think of at that time to spit out to the accepting public.

Taking a chance on the film in this review - it has turned out to be different from what I had expected.

I had read very few reviews on this film beforehand - information about the film was poured like a raging flood on the internet by enthusiastic countrymen who seemed to have been rejuvenated by a film about an honest-to-goodness Filipino hero - a leader to look up to in these trying days when it seems nothing has changed.

Generally speaking…the poor are well, still poor, the working class sends its breadwinners abroad, the rich are getting richer and a graph showing how many leaders are mostly known for their foibles than their true accomplishments would not be curving downwards - not anytime soon anyway.
We are still indeed our own worst enemy - and after all this time,

Skipping the film’s synopsis on the internet, I preferred to quietly sit and softly sift through the movie’s flowing scenes with a clean slate – armed only with vague memories dug up from afternoons of Philippine History lessons in high school.

Did I enjoy watching the movie - in it's totality, in its depiction of Heneral Antonio Luna and the other major characters who had defined a momentous part of Philippine history?

Creative liberties being taken by the producers aside, I can answer unequivocally - yes.

The humor which was injected into certain acts in the film was certainly Filipino. Something familiar. Something that the public would usually resonate to.
It was not a dry, urbane, morose retelling of how Luna persuaded *cough threatened? cough* people to his cause, steadfastly directed his military troops and faithful men, snatched clandestine moments with his beautiful Red Cross ladylove, dealt with President Aguinaldo and those he deemed as traitors to the nation.

It was a well-crafted series of scenes depicting Antonio Luna as a Filipino man - a human being like the rest of us, with feet of clay but striving manfully to be true to his own personal beliefs about what was good and just for his Motherland. He was portrayed as fiery, prone to curses (puñeta!) and loving his mother and this country with almost equal fervor – ready to die, ready to spill his own blood. In this day and age where more people are ever-ready to spill the other persons' blood for their own selfish betterment, who cannot help but be awed by this portrayal of a man with his nationalistic fervor and honest reactions, by his seeming nobility of spirit, by his trimmed mustache quivering in indignation against the perceived insult and injury to the Filipino people?

Do I think it is worth an Oscar award? That it would win an Oscar?
No.

It cannot be denied that the quality and caliber of this film is light years away from most of the Filipino canned, formulaic films we’ve been subjected to all these years.

Indeed, the direction of how the beautiful cinematography, ingenuous, well-thought-out script and theater-worthy acting were meld into an almost seamless tapestry of a riveting story - the Filipino audience will be elated to see at long last such “quality” standards making its presence felt in a Filipino film.

While its talented and familiar actors are certainly more than equal to the task of bringing to life one of our more colorful heroes and other players in this defining era of the our country’s history, I think back to the award-winning films I’ve seen, and regrettably, I do not feel that vicious “tug” on my heart and psyche that makes me jump to my feet and shout with glee - "It’s a shoo-in for Oscar night!" In short, competition is tough on this arena.

An important lesson I learned during business school is that, it doesn’t matter how or what you think, what matters is how your professor thinks. In the same way, it is the target audience for a movie which must be pleased, whose taste buds must be satisfied with gusto. The same way with the reviewers of such film festivals and contests.

While quite Filipino in its depiction of how my countrymen would react in situations (that train scene image where the temperamental General whipped the hangers-on out of the train will remain with me for some time!) such as a war in the late 1800s, or to life these days for the modern version, I had this niggling impression that a film camera was trained at the scenes of a theater production.

I felt that it had a theatrical bent, but was restrained from going full-blast as it was handled as a film and not an on stage production.

A historical story, a biopic film, which would have been typically given a serious tone and treatment, except that it must also appeal to a Filipino audience which unfortunately had been fed on a surfeit of dramas, canned shows, foreign films imported from abroad. It must beguile, it must enchant and it must not go overboard with black and white portrayals of the leaders of the revolution and war.

This is not to say that this film has not valiantly attempted to entertain as well as educate the almost-fried and dried palate of the Filipino movie viewers.

That this film, proudly and unashamedly, determinedly tackled Heneral Antonio Luna’s story to bring to the big screen - a biography of a larger-than-life hero but still seemingly distant figure who usually is relegated these days to decorate street names or staid history books not even probably taken seriously by the average Filipino student – that in itself is a feat that Heneral Luna himself may laud with a snappy military salute.

That it has generated all this positive response about its presence is a factor that I sincerely hope would mean better or superlative quality films being made by our talented filmmakers in the future – a fervent wish and long-held cherished dream that one day the majority of our films will garner its own share of critical and financial acclaim on a global scale.

Maybe Heneral "Articulo Uno" Luna’s ghost may rise up and decry my opinion (screaming puñeta! into my ear) but surely he cannot cite Articulo Uno at me for my article on one of the films depicting his life and role in our history. :-)