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Friday, May 30, 2008

Filipino Indie Film: Sa Pagdapo ng Mariposa

I've been invited countless of times to watch Filipino-made indie films, but it was only at the invitation of high-school-laboratory-partner-turned-multi-awarded-film-director (Rica Arevalo, Cinemalaya best director for "ICU Bed #7") that I succumbed to watching. I'm not much of a movie-goer so that's the main reason I haven't gone to any of the Cinemalaya festivals.

So for our monthsary, Sweetie graciously agreed to accompany me to watch Rica's short film "Gusto Kita Too" which was bundled with "Sa Pagdapo ng Mariposa". He didn't have any idea what he was getting into heh.




I saw AJ's plug-post about "Sa Pagdapo ng Mariposa" a few weeks ago so I had an idea what to expect. The film was about the struggle of Carlito Mariposa (Josh Deocares) in finding his true self. Being a physical therapist he becomes the caregiver of the paralyzed Agustin Vergeire (Marcus Madrigal) and that's where the conflict starts. Carlito falls in love with Agustin but struggles in accepting it since he grew up believing that he should stick to the traditional role of men and men do not fall in love with other men!

The storyline was very interesting. It's nothing new to me since I have a lot of friends who went through the same struggle (yup, I'm a fag hag! and proud to be one). Things were going on smoothly with the story, moving back and forth from past to present but this is what unleashes Carlito's angst about his true self. One would be tricked into thinking that after the gripping introduction that the story would end like how the sun sets, slowly and with the same steady beat it had acquired when Carlito showed up as a 25-year old caregiver. BUT! There's a definite twist at the end. I ended up gripping Sweetie's hand in the last few segments because I didn't expect the Carlito to end up like that. All I can say without giving anything away is "Poor, poor Agustin".

The story was very good and interesting. I just felt that they could've paced it faster, an hour and a half just seemed like forever. There was also quite a number of scenes that made me dizzy because the camera kept bobbing up and down. Made me think that whoever was holding a camera was pasmado. I don't know though if it was really presented that way, but it really made me dizzy.

The film also had a lot of songs played in it. They were great songs (Sa Ugoy ng Duyan was sung by Kuh Ledesma), I just hope they didn't need to finish the full length of the songs, it probably contributed to slowing down the pace.

The actors? Let's just say that Carlito scared me real good and I don't want to bump into him anywhere since I can't forget what he did in the last part of the movie. That's means they were effective actors.

Sa Pagdapo ng Mariposa is an interesting film, definitely indie but I have a feeling if you put celebrities as the actors it would be something that a lot of people would watch. I just cannot imagine any of the famous actors playing the roles though because it would probably get controversial.

Sa Pagdapo ng Mariposa and Gusto Kita Too show schedules
June 4-10 IndieSine, Robinson's Galleria
June 11-17 Robinson's Ermita

Up next: Gusto Kita Too and an interview with it's director Rica Arevalo

1 comment:

  1. I was able to see the movie and wow, grabe yung twist hehe ganda ng movie i even made a "hate post" about it LOL

    Gusto Kita Too made me smile hehe :)

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