TRAILER OF THE DAY: Inasiong ang Salonga Ni Tikoy (2011)

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The appalling issue that is Inasiong ang Salonga ni Tikoy.

And so I quote:

"For the first time in history, the most powerful mass medium of a society is totally controlled and dominated by advertisers and the market, totally driven by commercial imperatives, saturated by ubiquitous commercials that deliver audiences to advertisers (not programs to audiences), and an ever larger spectrum of channels delivering primarily garbage 365 days a year...

...In terms of cinema, this explains the very large importance of independent showcases and independent festivals. It explains the "exceptions" (from the Hollywood drivel), both those that constitute the content of this book as well as, even more importantly, those that continue to me made today. Not those fake "independent" films whose makers only aspire to be the next Hollywood stars, but those true iconoclasts and independents - feature,avant-garde or documentary filmmakers - who even under today's bleak circumstances audaciously continue to "transgress" (i.e. subvert) narrative modes, themes, structures, and the visual/aural conventions of mainstream cinema."----- FROM Preface of  FILM AS SUBVERSIVE ART by Amos Vogel

Ciao!
******

CINEPHILES! TOP 10 Best Films of CINEMALAYA 2011

...

With almost one year of existence this coming November 5, 2011 at Facebook, CINEPHILES! has become one of the most exciting destinations for all kinds of cinephiles: Filipino, half-Filipino and even an Indian cinephile named Vishal Verma! Aside from the unanimous interest of some of the active members to an eclectic array of films, from popular to more or less unseen films, it has also become an independent collective voice for the local independent film community here in the Philippines.

CINEPHILES! ---- WHO WE ARE

CINEPHILES have collected some of the best critics of Philippine cinema (Noel Vera, Oggs Cruz, Dodo Dayao, Arsenio Liao, Etchie Pingol, Mauro Tumbocon, Whammy Alcazaren, Manuel Pangaruy to name a few); emerging critics (Will Cabrera, Don Jacuian, Ira Lastrilla, Paolo Barazon to name a few); film authorities (Ronald Argueles of CinemaOne, Ramon Nocon of FDCP and SOFIA to name a two); film bloggers (Sani Ajero, Princess Kinoc, Queen Kinoc, Jo-Marie Bala, Jay-R Trinidad to name a few); film programmers (Chris Fajardo to name one); establish filmmakers, screenwriters, and technicians (Adolf Alix Jr., Khavn dela Cruz, Albert Banzon, Paulo Villaluna, "Redundante Mendoza", Alemberg Ang, Raymond Lee, Josel Garlitos to name a few); emerging filmmakers, screenwriters, and technicians (Sonny Lim, Epoy Deyto, Jzon Zulueta, Gino Santos, Jon Lazam, JP Carpio, Ramon Raquid, Jerome Morales to name a few); famous actors and actresses (Marife Necesito, Che Ramos to name a few), and the remaining deeply devoted cineastes who will die for the love of films. All of them have somewhat approximated the local film culture of not just Manila (since we have members all over the globe) but also current milieu of Filipino cinephilia, what Doug Cummings describe in his blog FILM JOURNEY four years ago as non-existent.

Just a little bit of history, CINEPHILES originated quite surprisingly from my irritation to the tagging game I played with some of my cinephile friends at Facebook, the game where you tag a post of your TOP 15 films to your 15 friends with different variations i.e. Top 15 LGBT Films, TOP 15 Filipino Films, TOP 15 Animated films. The lists went on and on and my wall got flooded. So I decided, one night, in between coffee breaks, why not make a facebook group for these guys? So I invited common tagging friends, I think there were 7 of them and they invited other film friends and the members got doubled, tripled and quadrupled overnight.

From time to time, some people walk out and some joined, and now with 498 members (active and inactive), the group has transformed itself from a harmless talk-a-talk film forum into an independent body giving, if not unsolicited, straight-from-heart, no-wooshy-hooey, even blunt commentary on local and international films which, to some people confided in me, have influenced outsider's point-of-view in films. Some have suggested the idea of making the group an official CRITICS' GROUP, an update of the now-aged Young Critics' Circle. But most of the CINEPHILES! chose not to muddle inside the complex world of the arts, celebrity gossips and the age-old onion-skinned attitude of the local film community to film criticism. They instead remained as what they are: a Facebook-based, stratified, eclectic, pluralist, informal and radical group nurturing and "destroying" each other, at their best intentions, via conversations, debates, and even gay-lingo crossfires about films and film-related gossips.

Occasional meet-ups were organized during film events such as festival and film screenings. Acquaintances became friendship and friendship became groupies. Somehow the trajectory of the group, as a result of pain-staking moderation and observance, aims towards the support of the local film industry, triumphantly championing independent and, occasionally, some good commercially released films of the studios. CINEPHILES! also converges towards the goal of reintroducing the younger Filipino audience to the classics of Philippine Cinema and old canonical films of other foreign countries, mostly European countries and the US. Film members also arrived at a commotion that there is a need to establish and nurture a Filipino audience who watches and appreciates Filipino films. CINEPHILES! have also received negative feedbacks and one of which is the air of elitism around it. Still in its infancy, the group grapples at establishing the available and most appropriate issues of the moment. I have never insisted the group to stop talking art films, avant-garde and exploitation films, nor did I encourage them to promote them. Each person has his own film experiences, and being a group itself, it is natural for someone to share these fleeting and sometimes, unforgettable moments with cinema.

TOP 10 BEST FILMS OF CINEMALAYA 2011

Of course, we love any kind of film events around the Metro. And with 7th CINEMALAYA Independent Film Festival brewing last July to August of this year, some of our members have watched if not all, most of the CINEMALAYA 2011 films. We organized a poll to determine the top 10 CINEMALAYA films for this year. With twenty-two poll entries received, each of them casted their top 10 ranked votes. To determine the consolidated rank of the film, we get the average rannk of per film. To get the average rank, we sum the rank scores for each film and divide it with the total number of votes per film. The categories (New Breed, Directors' Showcase, Shorts, NETPAC, out of Competition) were also disregarded in ranking favoring new releases or premiere status over categories. The lowest average rank will be TOP 1, second lowest will be TOP 2 and so on.

And now, presenting the TOP 10 BEST FILMS OF CINEMALAYA 2011:

10 | Ligo na U, Lapit na Me | dir. Erick C. Salud | Ave Rank: 6.72 | Votes: 9

9 | Walang Katapusang Kwarto | dir. Emerson Reyes | AR: 6.5 | V: 6

8 | Ang Babae sa Septic Tank | dir. Marlon Rivera | AR: 5.10 | V: 15

7 | Boundary | dir. Benito Bautista | AR: 4.4 | V: 5

6 | Isda | dir. Adolf Alix Jr. | AR: 3.97 | V: 17

4.5 | Busong | dir. Auraeus Solito | AR: 3.94 | V: 17

4.5 | Amok | dir. Lawrence Fajardo | AR: 3.94 | V: 16

3 | Ang Sayaw ng Dalawang Kaliwang Paa | dir. Alvin Yapan | AR: 3.62 | V: 19

2 | Zombadings 1: Patayin sa Shokot si Remington | dir. Jade Castro | AR: 3.4 | V: 6


1 | Niño | dir. Loy Arcenas | AR: 2.41 | V: 17

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Honorable Mentions: Cuchera (Joseph Laban), Maskara (Laurice Guilien), Bahay Bata (Eduardo Roy Jr. & Jerome Zamora), Teoriya (Zurich Chan), Bisperas (Jeffrey Jeturian), Hanapbuhay (Gino M. Santos), i-Libings (Rommel Sales) , Immanuel (Grabriel Puyat), Gayuma (Alvin Yapan), Rakenrol (Quark Henares), Liberacion (Adolf Alix Jr.), San Lazaro (Wincy Ong), Nono (Milo Tolentino), Hazard (Mikhail Red), Un Diutay Mundo (Ana Carlyn V. Lim), Niño Bonito (Rommel Tolentino), Natural Phenomenon of Madness (Bebs Gohetia), Every Other Time (Gino M. Santos), Patikul (Joel Lamangan).

Congratulations to the films who made it to the top 10! This maybe a small poll from a small film group, but we sure have favorites that deserve to be publicized. Join CINEPHILES! now and get a chance to join the poll at the end of the year for TOP 20 BEST Filipino FILM of 2011!

Ciao!

******

Ars Colonia (Raya Martin, 2011)

...and there you go!

Ars Colonia (2011)

Ars Colonia is a one-minute film by Raya Martin submitted for International Film Festival Rotterdam 2011 supported by Hubert Bals Fund. Raya Martin, one of the leading experimental filmmakers has a piquant style on long takes, the use of the video medium and stylized mise-en-scene. Ars Colonia, shot in Hi-8 camera and blown up in 35 mm, is obviously a visual film since its central rhetoric is based on images. It is an abstract film by all facets because it offers new ways of seeing things.

The technique of coloring a 35-mm celluloid is quite old. It has been used several times by many experimental filmmakers like Stan Brakhage in his Thigh Line Lyre Triangular (1961) [wiki] and J. J. Murphy's Print Generation (1973-74). Possibly, the origin of this style is the strong influence of Brakhage to Raya. The icons used in the film have strong alignment to Martin's historical mode of filmmaking which he started with Maicling Pelicula ng Indio Nacional (2005). In an attempt to draw the lost years of Philippine Cinema's silent era, he made a series of films that ascribe to silent film aesthetics; with Independencia (2009) as the most faithful to tableau staging and mise-en-scene.

With Ars Colonia he forges a new way to look at historical elements. Let us do a rough close analysis of these elements.

Frame by Frame

We are initially drawn to this man wearing a metal cap, possibly a soldier. The mise-en-scene is instantly displayed and we can infer by intuition that this is a man walking in sea water with islands around him. The film is shot in sepia tone using Hi-8 camera and blown-up and fast-forwarded in celluloid set in 'lomo' conditions. In its monotonal look, Martin transforms it into an highly stylized visual display.

On the above three screenshots, an observable change in the color of the sky from yellow to orange to read. The color of the sea remains dark blue. This suggest Martin's motivation in color and spatial differences. As we know, abstract films are motivated by form more than narrative. The offer new visions of old mise-en-scene. As with this one, Martin explores colors of the sky, using a pen-marker he etched it and somehow its speed is increase. It can be politically motivated, at one level wherein colors are used to indicate symbolic associations as with red to socialism or communism and yellow to the Aquino government. These associations can be results of over-interpretation, a hermeneutic limitation among us humans to judge visual cues based on personal biases and prejudices. However, this is not a discouraged path to take. This is often a result of our process of meaning-making out of these signs-and-symbols.

As with the above screenshots, there is an intent on exploring new ways to look at the island. The island transgresses from an ordinary-looking island with false-colored sky surrounded by murky blue water into bounded color-gradients with hints of its size and shape. This is the destruction of the concept of island in Ars Colonia. A cinematic moment called the death of subject wherein its concept metamorphose into other forms. As in the next shots, the island transforms into non-rigid color-effects similar to fireworks and explosions in the battlefield. The death of the subject is, of course, a postmodern bent which can be traced to Jean-Luc Godard's Un Femme est Une Femme (1961) and many other experiments in form.

Ars Colonia comes not from the surrealism trend which can be traced from Maya Deren's Meshes of the Afternoon (1945), Luis Bunuel's Un Chien Andalou (1929) but this can be traced from the works of Jackson Pollock, Ed Munch and many other abstract expressionists only that the expressionism in Ars Colonia is portrayed in 35-mm. The method of coloring the celluloid is historically motivated by these arts trends.

Lodging away from these aestheticism, we can infer so many allusions from the film. Questions like, is the island representative of the Philippines? Is the film about the death of the concept of being Filipino? What other hermeneutic lines can be drawn? Infinitely, we infer, ask and imply many associational aspects from the film. It offers numerous non-point concepts making it one good example of a postmodern film.

Ciao!
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