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Philippine movies plot digital comeback
Believe it or not, the Philippines can claim to have the oldest cinema history in Asia. Yet the Philippine movie industry is faltering compared to Asian neighbors. To predict its future we need to take a step back into the country’s past.
By Tessa Jazmines, 1 July 2006
As early as 1897 movies were shown in Manila that owing to its Spanish influences reveled in foreign niceties enjoyed by Western sophisticates. A Spaniard, Pertierra, showed movies like Un Homme Au Chapeau (Man with a Hat), Une Scene de Danse Japonaise (Scene from a Japanese Dance), Les Boxers (The Boxers) and La Place de L’Opera (The Place L’Opera) on a 60mm Gaumont Chrono-Photograph projector at a Salon in the elite district. By 1897, local documentaries were produced by a Spanish soldier, Antonio Ramos.
So enamored with films were Manila residents that just three days after Philippine national hero Jose Rizal was executed for inciting rebellion against Spain, Manila’s cognoscenti had gathered around Pertierra’s Salon in the elite Escolta district, to usher in a new invention called the cinematograph.
By 1900, the first hall for movie viewing was put up by a Britisher named Walgrah. In 1909 the first feature film made in the Philippines was produced, and in 1910, the first picture with sound came to Manila. Soon enough, the movies invaded the provinces that had electrical power. To date, The Philippines has the most number of movie houses from the urban to the remotest rural areas, says Boots Bautista, a film historian, who wrote a treatise on the History of Philippine Cinema.
By the 30s, Filipinos were already directing and producing movies. In 1933, Jose Nepomuceno produced the first Filipino talking film – Punyalna Guinto(Golden Dagger), which he followed up easily with another well-acclaimed project, Dalagang Bukid (Country Maiden) . In 1937, a full-length Filipino feature film called Zamboanga was produced and shown in theaters. It received accolades from no less than Hollywood director Frank Capra who called it “the most exciting and beautiful picture of native life I have ever seenâ€.
A Homegrown Industry
From the 30s to the 60s, the local film industry can be said to have its Golden Age. Nepomuceno, considered to be the Father of Philippine movies – paved the way for other big names that would be the pillars of Filipino cinema. Manuel Silos, Gerardo de Leon, Lamberto Avellana and Manuel Conde placed Filipino movies on the world stage by winning awards and accolades.
Manuel Conde’s immortal Genghis Khan (1952) was screened at the Venice Film Festival. Lamberto Avellana’s Anak Dalita. received the Golden Harvest Award for Best Picture in the Film Festival of Asia in 1956. De Leon’s Noli Me Tangere (Touch me Not, 1961) and El Filibusterismo (Subversion, 1962), Huwag mo Akong Limutin (Never Forget Me, 1960) and Kadenang Putik (Chain of Mud, 1960), helped to establish the Philippines as a major filmmaking center in Asia.
Films during Martial Law
In the 70s Ferdinand Marcos imposed censorship and dictated movie content to a certain degree. Yet the 70s saw new filmmakers who rose to the challenge of the time’s prescriptions and limitations. Lino Brocka and Salvador Bernal were leading influences during this period. Brocka made movies that criticized the Marcos regime. Brocka films defined the era, and the showing of his works in Cannes in the 70s and 80s, brought about a new appreciation of Filipino films and filmmakers.
Brocka’s Bayan Ko: Kapit sa Patalim (My Country: Gripping the Knife’s Edge, 1985) a defiant, open comment on torture, incarceration, struggle and oppression; Marilou Diaz-Abaya’s Karnal (1984), a story of how parricide ended a tyrannical
father’s domination, and Mike de Leon’s Sister Stella L. (1984), which tackled the theme of oppression and tyranny from a nun’s point of view, stood out in the era.
Alternative cinema – exemplified by films like Mababangong Bangungot (Perfumed Nightmare), which won the International Critic’s Prize in the Berlin Film Festival in 1977, Oliver by Nick Deocampo and Ang Magpakailanman (The Eternal) by Raymond Red made their mark during this period, called “the Second Golden Age of Filipino Cinemaâ€.
The Decline of Filipino Films
After its artistic and creative heyday in the 70s and 80s, the primary motivation for making movies in the 90s was commercial success. Original story lines that asserted themselves in the 70’s and 80’s all but disappeared. Genres and subject matter that were proven successful in past decades were simply recycled and featured younger stars who did not face much artistic challenge. Bold films became bolder and less tasteful. The making of “pito-pito†films (literally means “seven-sevenâ€, referring to the speed with which movies could be made within a period of seven days) all but showed the lack of professionalism in movie production.
Then came the Asian crisis that tested the Filipino movie industry. Hollywood films scored the box office hits and wiped out local projects from the race. Superior production, advanced technology and fresh subject matter heightened the disparity between foreign films and what the local movie industry was producing.
How Low Can You Go
Until the Asian crisis struck in 1997, the Filipino movie industry was thriving such that producers refused to seek new markets overseas. At its best, the industry produced 200 movies a year, scoring simultaneous blockbusters. But after 1997, the industry’s motors all but grinded to a halt. There were fewer new releases as audiences dwindled. Movie production slowed down to just about 30 projects a year – a far cry from the past. Out of work actors migrated to TV where commercial success was tangible.
Analysts say the death knell was due to many factors: Hollywood’s dominance, globalization, the peso-to-dollar exchange rate, lack of government support, high taxes and piracy.
The Wave of the Future
But Filipino filmmakers have the new digital technology to thank for their resurgence. In November 2004, Indy producer Tony Gloria of Unitel Pictures made the first full-length, commercially exhibited digital film. Titled Santa Santita (international name, Magdalena), the movie was helmed by award-winning director Laurice Guillen, a breakthrough movie during the time. Its content was more unique focusing on a religious theme and the character evolution of its Magdalene-like heroine. Magdalena was marketed as a breakthrough film using HD -- the new medium that would give local filmmakers new options and limitless creativity.
With the onset of HD technology, first time directors produced material that challenged content and approaches favored by big studios. Government, film schools and network institutions opened up opportunities for production fueling competition.
In July 2005, the UP Film Institute, the only Philippine member of CILECT, the International Association of Film and Television Schools, held a digital film festival that unveiled the works of young filmmakers who told stories in bold, new
ways.
In October the Cinemalaya (Freedom Cinema) Independent Film Festival introduced more material produced by film school students. One notable project was Mario Cornejo and Coreen Jimenez’s Big Time, a dark, comedy about “not too smart people dreaming of making it bigâ€. The indie filmmakers were celebrated for “making a Tagalog movie that doesn’t oversell a joke or rely on slapstickâ€.
More recently, the 7th Cinemanila International Film Festival unveiled entries to revitalize the Philippine movie industry. Grand winner (Best Screenplay, Best Actress, Best Actor, Third Best Picture) was Ala Verde, Ala Pobre by Briccio Santos, a European-schooled independent filmmaker, who focused on the perennial Filipino theme of poverty and corruption as seen from life along the railroad tracks.
Other young film makers – Topel Lee, Dilim (Darkness); Paulo Villaluna and Ellen Ramos, Ilusyon (Illusion); Ned Trespeces, Trabaho (Work) among many adapt to digital technology easily winning support from the big studios.
“Digital filmmaking has finally arrived and is maturing at a faster pace than we had all expected,†Santos said driving content production at lower cost for local filmmakers.
The Year of HD
Independent filmmaking is flourishing with the onset of low-cost digital technology, and enabled Filipino filmmakers like Raymond Red, Lav Diaz and Brilliante Mendoza to create projects that have earned accolades abroad.
Big studio Viva Entertainment has announced that it will produce 12 digital films in 2006 to take advantage of the cheaper filmmaking technology.
Vic Del Rosario, head of Viva Entertainment and presidential adviser on entertainment, laid down three proposals to revive the country’s dying film industry. These are: give a five-year tax holiday for digital films, exempt all film-related raw materials and equipment from taxes, and exempt local movies from amusement taxes for the next five years.
Of these proposals, the most feasible and immediately actionable is giving digital films a tax holiday, say cinema authorities. The holiday would spur more directors into activity, since every director seems to want to try his or her hand at digital filmmaking. Judging from the success of digital movies, digital films have also been making a strong showing lately, both on the local and foreign scene.
Case in point is Ang Pagdadalaga ni Maximo Oliveros (The Blooming of Maximoi Oliveros). A film about an adolescent homosexual who comes of age after he falls in love with a handsome, principled policeman, the movie has won the Golden Zenith Award at the 29th Montreal World Film Festival, the Special Jury Prize in the first Cinemalaya Independent Film Festival in July 2005, Best Feature Film in the 6th Annual imagineNATIVE + Media Arts Festival in Toronto, Canada, and Best Picture in the Asian Festival of First Films in Singapore.
The Future of the Movie Industry, the Future of Digital
In a country struggling with limited resources, digital films will allow for the marriage of creativity and practicality. Digital films are less expensive to produce. A digital project could fly for less than PhP1 million. The new cinematic “democracy†could also open movie screens to productions that have greater variety, freshness and depth, says film critic Nestor Torre.
The big cineplexes in the country’s top malls – SM, Robinsons and Star Mall –have started screening digital films. Students are the most enthusiastic amongst the target audience, particularly for alternative digital films.
Currently, the digital film industry and the independent film sector are enjoying a heyday. The government has offered financial and honorific incentives for quality film projects and has already pushed for a reduction in amusement taxes from city mayors. President Gloria Macapagal Arroyo is also clamping down on video piracy, instituting tougher laws and imposing stricter penalties.
The road ahead seems to be paved with opportunities but Filipino cinema still has a lot of catching up to do, if only to recapture its glory days and perhaps even hold its own against its Asian counterparts.
