~

I was having lunch with friends when the ladies started talking about what I assumed was a movie currently showing. I inquired about what movie was the conversation about and one of the women seemed reluctant to answer.

“Baka pagtawanan mo lang kami…” “You might laugh at us…” she said instead. So I deduced that it was probably a local film and I scanned my memory for recent showing local titles.

“You Are the One?” I guessed at the title. They nodded and I asked why they thought I’d laugh at them for having seen the movie. They told me they thought that I thought local movies were corny (or crappy) and that I don’t even watch them and put on a review on my Friendster blog.

Well, it’s not necessarily true that I hate local films. It’s just that if I’m going to pay 120 bucks for a movie, I’d rather spend it on a film that spent 40 million dollars to produce as opposed to a movie that has a total production cost of PhP 400k . Let me ask you, will you spend 500 bucks on a dress made from paper or on a dress made from the finest fabric?

I understand that it will look like I’m not helping out on the local movie industry. But you see when it comes to music, I download foreign songs and I buy our local albums. That’s supporting local music industry. What I’m only after is quality on the products I’m paying for. If I pay 120 pesos on a Hollywood flick, I’ll get to see exploding choppers, BMWs getting totalled or James Bond’s Austin Martin getting blown to bits. If I pay 120 pesos on a local movie, I’m lucky if I see a 1982 box-type sedan do a rollover – and these are the types of vehicles ridiculously-rich crime lords apparently drive. If we’re really lucky, we’ll see a Pajero exploding and the producers will run the sequence over-and-over for 5-8 times to get as much mileage for the investment.

What if it’s a drama film? Then I’ll simply be looking for acting skills. In fact, I used to love local movies and my all-time faves include Hihintayin na lang Kita sa Langit, Bituing Walang Ningning and other Sharon Cuneta or Dawn Zulueta flicks. Local box-office hits nowadays usually fall on the following categories: teeny-bopper love stories, comedies and horror flicks that merely recycle Japanese or other Asian-movie shocker scenes.

Back then, there was a lot of originality on our movies. They were inspired entertainment forms and producers were ready to take on any story and pull it off.

--