REVIEW: ‘Ang Huling Cha-Cha ni Anita’

By Randy Renier I. Espinoza

The big sleeper at the recently concluded CineFilipino Film Festival 2013, Ang Huling Cha-Cha ni Anita tied with Ang Kwento Ni Mabuti for the festival’s coveted Best Picture prize. Its lead performer, newcomer child actress Teri Malvar, caused an upsent when she was proclaimed Best Actress, besting multi-awarded actress Nora Aunor, who was predicted to win the plum. A worthy answer to Auraeus Solito’s now-classic Ang Pagdadalaga ni Maximo Oliveros, Huling Cha-Cha is a coming-of-age film by newbie filmmaker Sigfrid Andrea Bernardo about a young girl, Anita, who realizes her sexual identity when she starts falling in love with the new woman in the village.

Set in Obando, the film offers a subtext, conflicts larger than Anita’s own internal struggles, an underlying story from which Anita’s own saga is born and developed. Obando is known for its yearly fiesta that culminates in a mass fertility dance where townsfolk and devotees of Santa Clara partake of the festivities. Santa Clara, the town’s patron saint, is believed to be miraculous and grants the wishes of childless couples who, wanting to have children, join the dancing.

The narrative offers two parallel but somehow distinct worlds: the carefree world of children and that inhabited by adults who manage their domestic affairs and take part in community activities.

REVIEW: 'Ang Kwento ni Mabuti'

By Randy Renier I. Espinoza

Morality gets thematic focus in Ang Kwento ni Mabuti, the latest full-length feature by maverick filmmaker Mes De Guzman, who is also a recipient of multiple awards from the Carlos Palanca Memorial Awards for Literature. Shot entirely in Nueva Vizcaya, with dialogues rendered in the Ilocano language, the film is lifted by the noteworthy performance of Nora Aunor, dubbed the country’s "Superstar," as Mabuti de la Cruz, who faces a dilemma when she comes across a bag containing peso bills worth 5 million. Written and photographed by the director himself, Mabuti tied with Ang Huling Cha-cha ni Anita for the Best Film plum and won for De Guzman the Best Director and Best Screenplay awards at the recently held CineFilipino Film Festival 2013.

The story follows the pastoral life of Mabuti, a faith healer in a highland village who is known for her benevolence She practices traditional medicine without accepting payment for her services, and she takes care of the sustenance of the household, which comprises her mother and four granddaughters. Her son and daughter have left their children in her custody to seek livelihood elsewhere and do not give financial support for the kids. Complications come to the self-complacent and easygoing Mabuti when she learns, apart from her daughter being pregnant for the fourth time by a fourth lover, that the parcel of land on which their house and hillside farm are nestled will be sequestered if they can’t pay their overdue taxes.