Watched this at MMFF 2024 in Cubao today. I did not think it was even possible to adapt Himala (1982) dir. Ishmael Bernal, one of the most well renowned movies in Philippine cinema and an iconic, biting piece of social realist film making during the Marcos Sr. dictatorship… into some sort of shiny, popular Les Miserables type musical adaptation??? Not sure what Pepe Diokno was cooking here ngl… I personally couldn't fully resonate with the end product.
Technically it looks…
What a dense movie. Feels like a time capsule to 2016, at the height of the drug war under Duterte’s bloody regime. Scenes of carnage in daily TV news become mundane. Police become judge, jury, and executor for state sanctioned killings, while photojournalists capture the truth as it happens despite mass denial and apathy.
What goes on in the mind of the police, whose hands are stained by the blood of the innocent? Is it the system, or the individual…
Watched the restoration in Gateway Cubao. Sublime. Imagine having THIS film as your directorial debut? Such a slow burn, arthouse horror film. Excellent sound design and score. Shot composition out of this world — feels uncannily modern. A few hidden subtle visual references to martial law at the time (namely the desparaciros and tortures at the time).
