Sukob (Chito Roño, 2006)
English Title: The Wedding Curse
Philippine cinema belatedly joined the Asian horror bandwagon with the successful release of Chito Roño's supernatural horror Feng Shui, about a young mother who, by chance, discovers a magical ba gua that brings good fortune to her family in exchange for death of those unfortunate enough to peek into the mirror in the middle of the mysterious home decor. With the boxoffice returns of the film (a surprise for a Philippine film industry that is slowly dying due to the invasion of popcorn entertainment from Hollywood), other film studios followed suit with films with trite storylines, scary ghosts, and a handful of shock moments. Of course, there were exceptional films that came out of the bandwagon. There is Erik Matti's Pa-Siyam, a tale of a vengeful mother who is haunting her children before the traditional nine days of mourning ends, and Yam Laranas' Sigaw (The Echo), about a man who unfortunately shares his apartment floor with a mysterious couple who spends restless nights fighting. Asian counterparts are slowly getting tired of the horror craze, but the Philippines seems to enjoy the genre so much that big film outfits aren't thinking twice in shelling out money to fund these films.
Chito Roño's follow-up to Feng Shui is another horror film in the same vein as the big money magnet. Sukob (The Wedding Curse) is about Sandy (Kris Aquino) who is preparing to get married to her boyfriend for two years, Dale (Wendell Ramos). During their wedding ceremonies, Sandy suffers a mysterious nosebleed that is coupled with visions of a young girl, blackened and rotten, wearing a wedding gown. Everywhere Sandy sees the horrible wraith, her friends get killed and their corpses replaced by one of the traditional symbols and instruments of the wedding ceremony. Sandy and Dale begin an investigation to find out why their wedding is cursed, when they've followed each and every precaution that will prevent misfortune in the couple's married life. While Sandy's wedding is happening, visions of another married couple are shown. This time it is Diana (Claudine Baretto), recently married, who is suffering the same visions and misfortunes. Roño plays a trick here, deceiving the audience as to how Diana's storyline is connected to Sandy's. Roño makes it seem that Diana's storyline is a flashback --- a memory that is triggered so that the curse can be explained and a solution, discovered. Later on, we learn that the whole thing is merely a clever deception by Roño to develop a rather ingenious theme in the film.
It is never explained why the ghost, the visible representation of the wedding curse, is a young girl, but such makes for good horror. The visual appeal of it is quite haunting, and leads me to forgive the fact that much of the plot is bereft of logic. Roño seems to be using each and every trick that has been done before. In the middle of the film, Roño does a Ringu clone where the ghost somewhat transports itself from the window of a neighboring haunted house to a resort cottage far away, ala Sadako. It does get tiring and after a few repetitive scares (which I believe is also caused by the proliferation of similar shock techniques utilized by other films, not by Roño's directorial misfires), every ensuing attempt to scare and shock feels fruitless.
Being a major studio product, Sukob is technically sound. The cinematography matches up to the film's atmosphere and the musical score, unobtrusive. Kris Aquino reprises her scared, worried, terrified, mortified facial expressions that gave her positive critical reactions (undeserved, in my opinion) for her role in Feng Shui. Here, she gets tiring and it is quite fortunate that the other half of the story focuses on Claudine Baretto, a much more formidable actress (which isn't saying much since she's compared to Aquino here), who unfortunately has a lesser material to work with here --- a material that merely requires for her to cry, sob, get scared, and get slightly aroused in anger. The supporting castmembers are much more impressive. Ronaldo Valdez plays Aquino's father and provides the picture with a slight touch of humor that is flawlessly drawn by Valdez without being too out-of-place.
Roño bases his tale, co-written with Chris Martinez (who penned Jeffrey Jeturian's comedies Bridal Shower and Bikini Open), on old wives' tales of misfortunes dawning upon couples who wed within a year after the death of a loved one, or the wedding of a sibling. It's an ingenious concept, that allows Roño to examine the hypocrisies of the wedding ceremony, using a cautionary tale against infidelity. It is this irony that makes the film worthwhile despite its unoriginal trappings. Hopefully Roño doesn't stay rooted into making horror films, and using actors and actresses who only fare well when they look scared or terrified.
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