Reading Visual Art

Lecture Note 4: Film Making

The film industry is faced with a lot of
challenges. It is characterized by a lack of quality
films from its past studio years in the 1960s up to
the years after the fall of Marcos’ regime. Due to
the lack of tax incentives that could have been the
solution to quality control and economic stability
for the film industry, Hollywood films and other
foreign films accessible through cable television,
were preferred over local films.

As a result, independent filmmakers emerged so as not to be tied down by the economic,

thematic and technical constrains of the industry, working outside it and experimenting with the
medium. The establishment of the international movement known as the New Wave, according to
Bienvenido Lumbera, “freed directors from traditional techniques, thus giving rise to a renewed
energy and consciousness in filmmaking.” Signs of its arrival in the Philippines were seen in the on-
the-move camera technique, the use of informal everyday language, the unreserved manner of dealing
with sex, and the rebellious approach towards the social conventions and institutions.

Film Production

A new breed of Filipino directors was brave enough to direct films that portrayed revolt, labor
unionism, social ostracism, and class division. These were Lino Brocka, Peque Gallaga, Ishmael
Bernal, Celso Ad Castillo, and Marilou Diaz Abaya.

 Lino Brocka – he founded the organization Concerned Artists of the Philippines (CAP),
dedicated to helping artists address issues confronting the country. In film making, he used
“conventional love triangles, rape, and violent action,” which revealed the sufferings in
Filipino life due to economic exploitation through symbols and an elaborate plot. An example
is his Maynila: In the Claws of Light (1975) Maynila sa mga Kuko ng Liwanag.
 Peque Gallaga – was born in Manila and studied in Bacolod City. He directed the award
winning Oro, Plata, Mata and the famous Shake, Rattle and Roll 1,2,3,4 and more than 20
other films.
  Ishmael Bernal – is noted for his melodramas, particularly with feminist and moral issues. He
was awarded CMMA Best Director Award (1983), the Bronze Hugo Award in the Chicago
International Film Festival (1983) for the movie Himala (1982), which starred Nora Aunor.
 Celso Ad Castillo – Ang Pinakamagandang Hayop sa Balat ng Lupa. The human desire for
passion that lead and cause to jealousy, envy, hatred, and insanity.
 Marilou Diaz Abaya - was a multi awarded fil director and the founder and president of the
Marilou Diaz Abaya Film Institute and Arts Center, a fil school based in Antipolo City. Her
film, Muro Ami depicts on the worst form of child labor in the illegal fishing system in the
Philippines.

The Directors of the New Wave

The directors of the new wave either “tended toward exposing relevant social topics or
hybridizing Filipino topics with Western techniques.”

 Raymond Red – one of the first Filipinos to receive a Rottedam Hubert Bals Memorial grant,
and the first and so far only Filipino to have won the prestigious Palme d’Or award at the 2000
Cannes Film Festival for his short film Anino. Other film he created are Bayani and Sakay.
 Nick Deocampo – in his practice of non-fiction documentary films and short films, filmed
Revolutions Happen Like Refrains in a Song (1987) “a post mortem on the people power
revolution of 1986,” and A Legacy of Violence (1990), which he contributed “a view of the
history of the country.”
 Manny Reyes – Suwapings (1995), a story of a citizen’s rebellion against Barrio Talon’s
corrupt mayor whose plan was to dub a group of Filipino-Americans as hometown heroes if
they donate a huge amount of money to him. Another film by Manny Reyes, Dreaming
Filipinos (1992). It is a story of a man raised in the Philippines whose only obstacle to
graduating and returning to America, his birthplace, is his professor’s question, “What’s
wrong with the Filipino?” which he must answer in order to pass.

Digital Media in the New Wave

With the coming of digital media in the 90s and early 2000s, a New Wave in digital form
emerged.
  Brillante Mendoza – Thy Womb, is about the Tawi-tawi husband, Bangas-an (Bembol Roco)
and wife Shaleha (Nora Aunor) who had to end their marriage because tradition has it that a
man should leave his barren wife and take another one who can bear him a child.
 Cholo Laurel – Nasaan Ka Man (2005), which received awards as Best in Story, Screenplay,
Picture, and Direction in 2005 from the Filipino Academy of Movie Arts and the Gawad
Tanglaw ng Lahi. The film features a love story in the midst of a family full of secrets.
 Jerrold Tarog – Heneral Luna (2015) is a historical epic film about Luna and his comrades
embarking on compaign against the invading American force. Other films have earned him
numerous awards, including Busan International Film Festival in 2013 and the 2014 Osaka
Asian Films Festival.
 Maryo J. De los Reyes – won the FAMAS award for his Magnifico (2002), which tells the
story of a little boy who brings light to an impoverished town. The different conflicts his
family members faced took a toll when his grandmother who was diagnosed with stomach
cancer and was at a stage for which there was no cure. Dealing with the conflicts around him,
including money problems, he made it his goal to build a coffin for his grandmother.
 Erik Matti – Tiktik: The Aswang Chronicles, the first full-length Filipino film shot on green
screen chroma-key that “mixes elements of action, comedy, and horror in order to juxtapose
the old sensibilities of the aswang legend with contemporary style.” This film made heave use
of technology and the modern green screen.

The Critical Appreciation of Cinema

Typology a set of concept to direct the viewer’s attention to principal elements in the cinema
experience. Its purpose is to suggest the range of qualities within each element of film. The viewer can
look into the elements under three components: the visual, the dramatic, and the literary.

Image (medium)

I. Visual Texture:
Component
 Shape:
Size:
Focus:
Light:
Color:
Space:
II. Dramatic Sound/Music:
Component
Language/Diction:
Performance/Representation:
Montage/Editing:
Movement/Composition:
Time:
III. Literary Object:
Component
Place:
Event:
Sequence:
Plot:
Symbol:

Idea (meaning)

The typology, therefore, is only a map showing where those perceptions can be found. See how
this applies to Brillante Mendoza’s Thy Womb.
 Film (medium)
Title: THY WOMB
I. Visual Light: The setting is outdoor, mostly on water, even when
Component the scenes are inside a house, it is still standing on
stilts set on the body of water.
II. Dramatic Performance/Representation: The characters live in Tawi-Tawi, an island province
Component in the Autonomous Region of Muslim Mindanao
(ARMM). Most of them are poor but are generous.
There are pirates who steal their boats and belongings
and there are warring government soldiers and
Muslim secessionist. In their culture, when a couple
cannot have a child, the man should find another
woman who can bear him a child. This was the
dilemma that Bangas An and Shaleha was confronted
with. This drama and the realistic performance pf the
actors and actresses stirred the emotions of the
viewer.
III. Literary Symbol: The story revolved around the sacrifice of Shaleha,
Component not only in living a life of poverty while making a
living as a midwife, but also in search for a new wife
for her husband who can bear him a child. Despite
their love for each other, their culture dictates that
Shaleha set her husband free and settle with another
woman to start a new family.
When the new wife finally bore a child with the help
of midwife Shaleha, all three were happy. Shaleha
had to detach herself from Bangas An and live a life
on her own because her former husband now has a
new wife and a child. This is another sacrifice she
has to make, the most difficult one.
Idea (meaning)

The movie projected a loving relationship between husband and wife. Unfortunately, cultural traditions
had to be honored so the barren woman had to let go of her husband. The choice that Bangas An had to
make was a difficult one: the child he longs for, which will aslo satisfy tradition or the wife he shaed a
life with. Both had to sacrifice. Shaleha was left to go on with life by herself while Bangas An had to
start a new life with his new family.