Marilou Diaz-Abaya’s landmark films revisited
By verafiles / Oct 22, 2012 / By PABLO A. TARIMAN
IT was a good thing that Channel 7 showed four landmark films of Marilou Diaz-Abaya on the weekend she was laid to rest.
It is a coincidence that GMA Films produced three of them – “Sa Pusod Ng Dagat,” “”Muro-Ami” and “Jose Rizal.”
Like it or not, these films make up for an excellent trilogy of Abaya’s output.
For what it was worth, Abaya’s “Milagros” was indeed existential and it showed that Abaya is one of the original indie filmmakers whose mainstream films don’t always conform to the tired-and-tested commercial formula.
“Sa Pusod Ng Dagat” is Abaya’s tribute to the sea and it is amazing how the film flows spontaneously like the life cycle in the rural areas. The inhabitants are virtual captives of the island they consider home. To most, this is where they are going to live and die. A few wanted to leave it for a better life in the city.
But those who wanted to remain the film exalts with bold strokes. It was refreshing to see the village comadrona taken over by a young man (Joemari Yllana) who narrates his idyllic beginning in this village by the sea and ending with a shot of him trailed by children whose birth he had facilitated and witnessed.
“Jose Rizal” remains an engrossing film and surely the acting here was the best of Cesar Montano and Jaime Fabregas as Rizal’s lawyer.
Watched by TV audiences on a weekend, “Muro-Ami” remains a towering film.
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