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Reality bites-sometimes it beats you unconscious, too

Posted 08:36pm (Mla time) May 07, 2005
By Elvira Mata, Nice Rodriguez
Inquirer News Service


Sa Aking Pagkakagising Mula Sa Kamulatan
Directed by Ato M. Bautista
Exclusively at Glorietta 1, Ayala Center, Makati City.

OUR TWO reviewers finish a large bag of popcorn 10 minutes into this
in-your-face movie. Sometimes reality doesn't just bite; it beats
you unconscious.

ELVIRA: If you want to know the kind of men you shouldn't bring home
to mom and dad, see this movie because they're all here. Pogi
(Ketchup Eusebio) swears, smokes, gets drunk and lives off his mom,
who probably works as a domestic helper or a caregiver abroad. Taba
(Hector Macaso) dropped out of school a semester shy of graduation
and spends his days drinking beside this sari-sari store. Jopet
(Cholo Barreto) has been sexually abused by a policeman named Lakay
(Lito Pimentel) but he's too scared and too dumb to do anything.
Kahoy (Empoy Marquez) is a jeepney barker/cellphone snatcher. Rey
(Carlo Aquino) has a girlfriend but he's too weak and too unsure of
himself to do anything about the relationship.

NICE: This film is dirty. If you were to compile all the repulsive
Filipino words ever uttered, they would add up to the screenplay.
For such a superb listing of obscene and foul words alone, this film
would stand the test of time. It's a linguist's find.

ELVIRA: Although it has a longish title like "Pirates of the
Caribbean: The Curse of the Black Pearl," this is a far cry from
Disney. It's one of those movies you should see but, in parts where
it gets too violent, you have to look away.

NICE: Metro Manila renders so well on digital video. The medium is
portable; thus, it can quietly penetrate the city's tight interior
streets. Also, its ability to shoot in dark places helps capture the
city's texture so well. The movie is like an unobtrusive tour, with
a tanod, of an underprivileged barangay. Owing to its digital
format, the film exposes a pixilated and grainy metropolis-subject
and technique effortlessly merge. Because of this compatibility, I
wouldn't be surprised if we produce more films of this genre and
become the toast of international independent film fest circuits.
This is filmmaking straight from the gut; the market will extract
more gore, more violence, more sex and more perversion from us.
Question: If we do find an audience, are these all that we can tell?

ELVIRA: If government officials want to know what's out there, they
should see this movie.

NICE: Pogi, bragging about his sexual exploits, sets the pace. The
flood of cursing and rude talk is excessive and seems endless. The
movie is narrated by the nerdy student Rey. He is self-conscious,
plain and boring-is he really the main character? Then he is beaten
unconscious and waxes philosophical. He shines doing kung fu with a
bread knife, though. Pogi's gang mates include Jopet, Kahoy and Taba
This movie reeks of testosterone: the gang calls each other Betlog
(slang for testicle).

ELVIRA: ... not Pare, Brod or Igan.

NICE: The men try to upstage each other in alcohol-guzzling, rage,
passion, wit and brutality. A fight ensues during basketball
practice and even the ball becomes a weapon! There is only one main
female character, Angel (Luanne Dy), who plays a superficially
virginal, but secretly promiscuous, student. There is an interesting
sub-plot that translates to a mini-thriller, about two she-males.
The whole movie appears disjointed but, like "Pulp Fiction,"
miraculously comes together in the end.

ELVIRA: Yeah, my insides felt like they were going through the
wringer and beaten to a pulp watching this movie. It's just too
real. Maybe they should film "Survivor," not in Boracay or Bohol,
but in this neighborhood.

NICE: Much credit should go to videographer Odyssey Flores and his
lighting crew. Although his cigarette smoke effect becomes redundant
throughout the movie, it appears like smog at night. His distant low
light shots, as well as his back-lighted scenes, are excellent. Like
a slide show, his series of external shots- framed by the jeepney's
entrance-pulsate, making the holdup scene very powerful. While the
concept of a holdupper being held up himself is hilarious, the image
of the helpless victims beside a lamp post is so pathetic, I wanted
to cry. I have been robbed once.

ELVIRA: I was once robbed, too, at the plasticware section of SM. I
love plastic! The thief got my decoy wallet, the one with only P100.
My real wallet was buried deep inside my bag.

NICE: Other remarkable characters are the eight-year-old Rugby-
sniffing streetboy and Angel's God-fearing father (Bodgie Pascua),
her implied abuser. The movie's musical score is austere but
effective. This is not a movie for the faint-hearted. The tension
will make you eat more popcorn than usual, but it is a movie you
carry back home and think about later.

ELVIRA: I can't get over the title, "Sa Aking Pagkakagising Mula Sa
Kamulatan." In English, awakening from consciousness.

In common speech, consciousness is being awake and responsive to
one's environment, which contrasts with being asleep, being in a
coma, being dead drunk or, in the case of Rey, being in denial about
his environment, himself, what he wants and where he is going. In
the end, his environment and past experiences come to a head. He is
beaten unconscious and when he comes to, he finally understands.

He has achieved the state of knowingness-gets na niya!- and proceeds
to get even.

posted by < tofu kid> @ 12:22 AM