There is always something apocalyptic about the annual Metro Manila Film Festival (MMFF). As there is always something indescribably non-inspirational and threatening about the announcement of the kinds of films that qualify in the notorious festival. Well, notorious for those of us—and there is a significant number of us—who feel the whole shebang is really a glorified fund-raiser, a term I borrow from those who have the prescience to see through this MMFF.
One always gets this sense that a big instrument or institution has set up a platform, a stage, for films with superfluous and sure promise of box-office returns. Commerce and certainly not art and any semblance of original storytelling, critical positions or any daring new filmic directions are promised.
When was it that a new selection committee and, eventually, a different group of jurors were ordained to oversee the MMFF? At the end of the festival, a vociferous call for non-intellectual films or “good films” was called.
As some movie directors claim, filmmaking is a business. Now there is no question about that. As some directors also claim, filmmaking has become an art form, an ideology, a politics. Now, there is no question about that either. Films have evolved also from being merely entertainment; films have become teaching tools. This is the very reason why films of any kind are used in classrooms to teach about societies, cultures and politics.
The question arises and the doubt comes with it when government institutions, bodies that are supposed to use films and other art forms to teach, enlighten or allow the people to have the critical faculties, use their power to enable producers to make films for the sole purpose of “entertainment,” and, in the process, earn for the producers wealth. All this at the expense of the purpose of the government to use the arts for something more ennobling. All this at the expense of the moviegoers who are (or are we not yet aware of this?) not given any choices each year, when Christmas day falls upon us like a nugget of gold we do not have a share in.
There lies the very sin of this film festival. Each year, the government makes the viewing of commercial films, by default, compulsory. There it is, that word—“compulsion.” There are no other films to choose from aside from these Filipino films. There are no other films (except for a film or two) good enough in the sense of rewarding the Filipino audience with laughter that comes at a very high price.
The producers, the actors and other filmmakers who go without questions into this enterprise called MMFF, their reasons are varied and, in the view of the limited territories for self-examination and debate, compelling at first glance. One reason is that we have no reason to stop from having fun and joy during Christmas. I find this position not only preposterous and reductionist but also dumb and duplicitous. One need not shell out more than P200 to have fun and joy during Christmas. The whole season is already one f—king trading exercise. Or have we forgotten that ours is the longest celebration of Christmas in the whole world, a claim that makes the businessman salivate?
Actors who we presume have more intelligence between their well-paid and subtly perfumed ears do join in the discussion. Their point: Who are we to dictate what people want to view? Exactly the point of this discourse: If we are to create a nation of thinking individuals, then we really do not have the right to create a space where people, by the nature of their moviegoing habits, can only watch films that can only make them laugh for some two hours, given the sharing that follows each viewing, and spend the rest of the day farting mindlessly. Do not get me wrong: I am not about to insult the minds of those who love films. If we do have a population that enjoys films, then let them do so at the freer space of producers generating interest in whatever kind of films they wish to instill in the audience they feel would benefit from their productions. Again, this position is problematic: Do producers really think of what the audience can take home when they fund films that have silly plots, or possessing of the sense of humor laced with the derogatory, depleted and vacuous?
Assume that these comedians and clowns really have it in their hearts to entertain the public. Assuming that these showbiz citizens indeed want to bring joy into the hearts (not the homes, for that would be the function of the more insipid TV programs) of the MMFF viewers, what signs can manifest that concern, that love? Well, let me remind the fans who subscribe to the gospel of these entertainers. At the end of the festival, they, the moviegoing public—if they belong to that group we are enamored to label the “poor”—they will remain poor. As for their favorite comedians, they will be sallying forth to the rosy sunrise or whatever sunset, with their bank accounts fatter because many of us were dumb enough not to see the tricks behind their magical lack of logic and reality.
Not all is lost.
Online the debates about the evil of the MMFF are lacking no prophets and soothsayers.
Jerry Gracio, a multi-awarded writer, cultural worker and filmmaker (he did the screenplay with Khavn de la Cruz of that gloriously insolent Balangiga: Howling Wilderness), continues to lament the MMFF each year and what it brings to our film industry. Gracio is clear about his solution—film education. What we need is to educate future audiences. He calls on local governments to be more active in this field. Gracio also believes we should start with schools and there, with teachers. Indeed, teachers have the multiplier effect.
It is also Jerry Gracio who calls our attention to the person of Joel Lamangan. Gracio reminds us that while young critics or viewers may have criticized the films of Lamangan, the veteran director remains one of the staunchest critics of MMFF and what it stands for. Relentless and vastly articulate, Lamangan fights for his cause from the inside.
Joselito “Jay” Altarejos, who, in my book, remains the compelling if not disturbing voice of the angst of the gay male in his films, sees the problem of the MMFF from outside. He calls the problem that plagues the festival as brought about by the structure of the competition. Altarejos sees the affliction as “structural” and “systemic,” and until it remains so, he does not see himself being part of it.
Oggs Cruz, a favorite critic of mine, outside of course the Manunuri ng Pelikulang Pilipino of which I am a part, did a glorious homage to Pauline Kael (attribution solely mine). He enumerates the faults of the films that were entered into the Metro Manila Filmfest and, in return, received ad hominem comments from many who do not understand the work (and mission) of a critic.
Here is Cruz, via Rappler, talking of Vice Ganda and Fantastica: “Instead of coming up with a lucid narrative where Vice Ganda finally gets to achieve what she promotes in the end, which is to love and be loved, no matter who you are, she still insists on being the butt of a staggered joke, the truly unfortunate damsel who gets to save the day but is jokingly rejected by the two men she selflessly helps.” Cruz continues: “Fantastica only proves that Vice Ganda’s comedy is inconsistent with what she presumably stands for. Here, she is either an incoherent messenger of mixed slogans or just a shallow entertainer who is content with getting empty laughter.”
Interestingly, when writers would call a film “chaka,” no one really cares. But it is when writers or critics or even an actor of good standing express their disgust in lucid prose over what troubles the film industry, that our small world sits up and take notice.
It should behoove the industry players therefore to look at this irredeemably mercantile approach to film as a whole. This practice of pulling out the non-box 0ffice giants from moviehouses speak of what is entirely wrong about this festival. This concourse primarily claims to celebrate everything that is good about Filipino cinema and yet betrays its double-dealing face when its act negate what it pontificates and rhapsodizes as a moving and inspiring force for the nation as the year turns.
Nora Aunor was correct when, upon winning the Best Actress for Thy Womb in the 2012 edition of the MMFF, she spoke how she would continue to make movies so long as there are still people who admire good films. By the same token, the critics would and should continue to rage against films that shamelessly do not give the people the chance to experience the film as a source not merely of moral lessons but as the beginning of the moral strength to look into art forms, which provide the images for us to doubt authorities, subvert totalizing entities, and rejoice in our differences, conflicts, harmonies and dissonances.
And so, happy new year?