Amok (Lawrence Fajardo): Law outdoes himself. Compared to Inarritu. Better than Inarritu. Much, much better. * * *
Busong (Aureus Solito) Searingly beautiful yet emotionally remote. I felt nothing all throughout the film except maybe an uneasiness at one or two instances where the Apichatpong cribbing gets profuse and overt and being terribly impressed at Aureus' conviction and dedication to his material. Louie Quirino's cinematography is amazing, though. Still, left me cold. * * 1/2
I-Libings (Rommel Sales): Visually flat, almost sloppy, overbearing music, rather ugly . . . but its second half comes emotionally alive. Uniformly fine acting specially from Glaiza De Castro and Earl Ignacio. * *
Niño (Loy Arcenas): I hate opera. I hate family dramas. I hate child actors. All of which figure prominently here. I loved it. Probably unflattering to compare it to Ang Lee during his arthouse prime but this reminds me a bit of Eat Drink Man Woman or even Olivier Assayas' Summer Hours, not in the sense that it blatantly copied elements (the lifting was more glaring in Busong) but in terms of the deft ensemble dynamics. Lewd and funny yet somehow sober, despite being increasingly prone to melodrama. Fides Cuyugan-Asensio is a delight and gets to deliver not only the film's funniest lines but the film's funniest line: "Paabot nga ng patis." You had to be there. * * * *
San Lazaro (Wincy Ong): Pitched somewhere between Edgar Wright and Chito Rono, albeit without the former's slavish geekiness and the latter's visual flair but also without the latter's foolish insistence to attempt million dollar CGI effects on several thousand pesos. Entertaining and surprisingly, or may be not so much, clever. There are two subtle twists in the end that are arguably more satisfying than anything by Shyamalamadingdong, perhaps because Wincy doesn't make too much of a fuss about revealing it. * * *
Ang Sayaw Ng Dalawang Kaliwang Paa (Alvin Yapan): Bizarre love triangle melding feminist poetry, dance and pop music that's really a broken valentine to obsolescence. * * *
