NCCA and Philippine Cinema

[Posted on UP Film Institute mailing list, 2010-07-25. For registration details, visit the site.] 

NCCA's Crafting the New School in Philippine Cinema

CALL FOR PARTICIPATION

Last February, the NCCA Cinema Committee conducted during the Philippine International Arts Festival a successful showcase of regional films in an event called “Cinema Rehiyon”.  The huge turnout proved to all the presence of a thriving and ever-growing national cinema based in the regions. As revealed in the background profiles of the various filmmakers who participated in the event, a large number of the films were done as part of school requirements. 

Realizing the influence of teachers on filmmakers and the kinds of films that are made, the seminar-workshop aims to provide teachers with a holistic perspective on the “new school” of Philippine cinema – how with digital technology current practices related to the production, exhibition, distribution, and copyrighting of Filipino films are being reshaped and altered. It also seeks to raise the awareness among teachers for their curriculum programming of the manifold potential of digital cinema content not only as a stand-alone work but also as an integral element of other new media forms.

“Crafting the New School in Philippine Cinema” is a project of the National Commission for Culture & the Arts Cinema Committee and the De La Salle-College of Saint Benilde School of Design & Arts in partnership with Saint Theresa’s College Cebu.

The topics will be grouped into several tracks that include The Domain of Digital Filmmaking, Film Beyond the Theater, Intellectual Property, Curriculum Development, and Establishing a New Media Infrastructure in the School among others. In addition to rich discussions on the topics, participants will also be engaged in experiencing key production and post-production work as applied in actual film/video industry settings.

Modules across tracks will be conducted simultaneously during the conference, this means that participants have a veritable “menu” of break-out sessions that they can attend to form a holistic learning experience. Given this format, we highly encourage schools to send at least 2-3 participants to best cover the largest amount of topics across tracks and maximize the benefits of the conference. 

This is open to all educators who handle courses in Introduction to Mass Communication, Multi-Media Presentation, Media Literacy, Video Production, Film Appreciation, and other related courses. This is also open to Graduate-School students of communication and film, film industry professionals and facilitators of video- and film- related workshops.

There will be two separate schedules for the seminar-workshops:

1. Aug 5-7, 2010 for Luzon and NCR participants at the De La Salle-College of Saint Benilde, Vito Cruz, Malate, Manila and,
2. Aug 19-20, 2010 at St. Theresa’s College Cebu, Don Ramon Aboitiz St., Cebu City for Visayas and Mindanao participants. 

There is a minimal fee of 2,000 pesos for registration which covers meals, hand-out materials and a copy The Media Kit Books 1 and 2. Pre-register now to reserve slots for your institutions’ delegate(s). 

Deadline for registration is July 30, 2010.

"Revolution in the consciousness"

[E-mailed 14 July 2010 by Dakila Collective, most likely, friend Van. Got express mail also. Image below is the postcard invitation.]

True revolution begins in the imagination.

DAKILA - Philippine Collective for Modern Heroism with the support of the Commission on Human Rights, the United Nations Development Program (UNDP), the Embassy of the Kingdom of Netherlands and the Embassy of Australia, would like to request the honor of your presence on the Opening Night of the Active Vista Film Festival on July 20, 2010, Tuesday, 7:00 in the evening at the Cinema 4 of the Shangri-La Plaza Mall, Edsa, Mandaluyong City.

Active Vista, as the name implies, calls for a more dynamic way of watching films, which is to say, seeing. Our mission is to shape a revolution in the consciousness of the viewing public towards the understanding of human rights as the integral foundation of responsible citizenship and nation building. 

The Active Vista Film Festival is a human rights film festival that will be held in 17 key cities nationwide from July to December 2010. Active Vista offers not only the screening of more than 30 films nationwide but also a short film competition among young and aspiring film makers and an advocacy film making camp in Luzon, Visayas and Mindanao. 

Dakila is an organization of artists and individuals promoting social consciousness formation through the creative arts. Dakila believes that while art may not change the world, it can change the way we view the world. True revolution begins in the imagination.

For the Festival Opening, we will be screening SIGNOS, a film by Mike de Leon, Jose F. Lacaba, Sylvia Mayuga, Ricardo Lee, Ding Achacoso, Joe Cuaresma, Lito Tiongson, and Joey Zarate. This 1983 film is an independent Brecthian styled documentary about the anti-censorship protest movement, labor and student rallies, and the funeral of Aquino. 

Be part of the Active Vista Film Festival and contribute to this collective effort to enrich, enlighten, educate and entertain the Filipino public. While the support you may provide will not change the world overnight, it will help shape the minds of our people, one viewer at a time. Thank you very much.

Check out www.activevista.com for screening schedules.

Off-stage repartee

I'm a "people watcher". Sometimes I get my entertainment not from the events I attended but from other people in attendance. At the recently concluded Virgin Labfest 6, interactions I observed from people around me also make for good blogging. I didn't need to be consciously snooping around. The opportunities would present themselves, unsolicited.

Snacks

On my way to CCP, I made a quick stop at Mercury Drugstore to buy medicine and bottled water. While walking towards the beverage section, two girls blocked my way, seemed to be in argument over one-liter PET bottle of C2 (iced tea drink) of the yellow variety.

GIRL 1 (cradling the C2 bottle): Bakit ba? Masarap naman to ah.

GIRL 2: Eh, basta! Wala na bang iba? Ayoko nyan noh... 

(GIRL 2 starts looking around for something else.)

GIRL 1: Ako naman ang bibili ah. Bakit ba?

(GIRL 2 stares at friend then starts walking away, sulking. GIRL 1 follows, obviously exasperated.)

GIRL 1: Oh eto. Gusto mo ng snacks?!

(GIRL 1 grabs from a nearby shelf 100g. pack of Nescafe powdered coffee, then slaps it on GIRL 2's shoulders.)

Button Pins

While in the CCP Gift Shop, Eon jabbing his notebook PC blogging in career mode, and I sipping hot chocolate and reading news on my cellphone, two girls (not the pair above) entered. One looked bored, the other took interest in a bowl of button pins with assorted designs.

GIRL 1 (one hand deep into the bowl): Ay! Gusto ko ng ganito. Eto kaya? Bagay ba?

(GIRL 1 shows to friend GIRL 2, who looks over lazily then away again, seemingly hoping to find something to interest her. GIRL 1 couldn't decide, looks for more, and thinks out loud repeatedly "Eto kaya?")

GIRL 1 (a little more excitedly): Or... eto kaya?

GIRL 2 (looks and dead pans): Hmmm... bagay.

I looked up and saw what GIRL 1 was holding up: the button pin says, "MAARTE."

Meaning

As audience were exiting for intermission, two young people behind me were evaluating the recently concluded play. I couldn't see them but they sounded younger than me, one male and one female.

MALE: Woah! Grabe. Ano tingin mo dun sa play?

FEMALE: Ewan. Gosh! I was so bored. Hindi ko maintindihan.

MALE: Ah baka because it's in English...

(Three-second pause.)

FEMALE: What? What are you trying to say?

(Not unexpectedly, pregnant silence between the two.)

Cinemathematique

For the sixth Cinemalaya Independent Film Festival and Competition, I bought three Day Passes, July 10, 11, 17, each day with five tickets, each ticket one screentime. I noticed in the program brochure that none of the entries in competition will ever show at 10:00 AM screentime. In one theater, there's an extra screentime of 11:45PM but not on my Day Pass dates, and the feature films are not in competition (more about this on a later post).

On my Day Pass dates, 10:00AM screentimes feature "Cinemalaya Kids Treats" and a special screening of Chito Rono's Emir (on the 17th). All features for exhibition. If you're like me, whose objective is to watch all those in competition, the 10:00AM tickets are essentially worthless. So the Day Passes will only afford me 12 of the 16 entries. I will need to buy an extra four tickets at 150 pesos each, or 600 pesos extra.

Twelve entries for the Day Passes worth 1,500 pesos, plus extra four worth 600 pesos, total 2,100 pesos or 131.25 per competition entry (note: ten entries under Competition Shorts are counted here as two units, Sets A and B). If I had the Festival Pass, it would have cost 93.75 pesos per entry. If all entries' screenings were bought on-the-spot, 16 screenings will cost 2,400 pesos. So with this "investment package", I am alleviated 300 pesos from the profiteering or 18.75 per competition entry.

With 300 pesos savings, I have 60 pesos per day of Cinemalaya experience to defray for allowances in transportation, food, and the occasional yosi break. In addition to the three days for the Passes, the program brochure tells me I can watch two other entries on Monday, 12th and another two on Friday, 16th, working hours factored in.

This is simple poor man's economics - it may not yet be a discourse on whether Cinemalaya, for its potential contributory value in cultural development, actually is accessible to benefit greater numbers.

Committed, fatalistic

It's a big commitment for me. This afternoon I dropped by CCP to take a chance of getting that one thing that eluded me last year, a Festival Pass to Cinemalaya Independent Film Festival and Competition. (Dear one or two readers, you know that I even tried my luck in a reasonably exhausting blogging contest that had this as first prize.) When I left CCP an hour later, the Festival Pass remained elusive.

But I made a big commitment. It's reasonably sizable in terms of cost. For the love of... er... now I don't know what really, per sales pitch cum recommendation of the CCP ticketron, I settled to buy three Day Passes. I tried to shove away my nagger alterego when I made the decision but I silently hoped and prayed that I won't regret the decision afterwards.

For this year's Cinemalaya, the sixth, there will be nine full-length features competing for "New Breed" category, and five for "Directors Showcase." There will be two sets of "Competition Shorts" each featuring five entries. To see all entries in competition, a moviegoer will have to attend 16 screenings. For 1,500 pesos, a Festival Pass holder will get to enjoy watching all entries (at dates, times and theaters of his choice). But the Pass is a severely precious limited commodity.

In comparison, the Day Pass is composed of five tickets, each indicating a screening time (10:00AM, 12:45PM, 3:30PM, 6:15PM, 9:00PM), no feature title, no theater specified, but all dated on the same day. Each Day Pass cost 500 pesos.

I had this feeling that at the moment that ticket selling for Cinemalaya opened, every day that I resisted the impulse to leave everything work-wise and troop to the ticketron and buy, I was increasing my risks. It's such crushing frustration to actually affirm this feeling when one arrives at the ticketron, Festival Passes in view, but the takilyera can't/won't sell.

"Isa pong Festival Pass," my three 500-peso bills thrust almost violently into the takilyera's face.

"Sir, filmmaker po ba kayo? Kasi para sa filmmakers na lang po ang mga ito." Then glassy-eyed, two-second pause. (Big mistake.)

"If I say that I am, will you sell me a Festival Pass?" Takilyera looked bemused then stared at my chest. I was still wearing my DOH ID. I didn't push for a complicated lie/act, it felt undignified.

In fairness, she sounded sympathetic, offered me the Day Pass alternative. Even gave me, very discreetly, the Cinemalaya program brochure to study the options. (At that time, which was minutes before the ceremonial Opening Night, masses of collegiate reaction paper assignees were causing a riot for an also rare program brochure.)

I left the ticketron, went to the gift shop, which has become my and Eon's customary hangout during the VLF6 pilgrimage. Every nook and cranny of CCP seemed abuzz for the Opening Night, even the gift shop transformed into a department store on Midnight Madness Sale mode. The program brochure, hard as I tried, looked incomprehensible. 

Felt pressured at the thought of possibly losing chances even at getting Day Passes. The ticketron, within view from the shop, was receiving a rapidly growing demanding clientele. Single screening tickets cost 150 pesos; this third option is most unappealing for the bulk buyer. Definitely, I won't go for walk-in, on-the-spot ticket-buying during Cinemalaya, I promised myself. I still need to see a shrink to exorcise the trauma of last year's nightmare cloaked as festivity.

So, the Fatalistic Filipino did what he would in consideration of all this. I went back to the ticketron, queued and spent the three 500-peso bills on three Day Passes, July 10,  11 and 17. Next post: the consumer math behind impulse buying.

Dress you up with Cinemalaya

From a flyer distributed on the last day of Virgin Labfest 6. I wonder who will come and "wear" as Arnold Reyes' character in Astig, full-length feature in competition from Cinemalaya last year, preferably, after his make-out scene with a sex worker. (Actually, I prefer Arnold Reyes to do this himself. *grins*)

CINEMALAYA 6 COSPLAY (COSTUME PLAY)

Join the COSPLAY (Costume Play) in the Cinemalaya Film Festival 6 Opening Ceremonies on July 9, 5:00 PM at the CCP Main Theater Lobby.

Wear costumes and accessories to specify a character or idea from Cinemalaya entries of the past five (5) festivals (e.g. Come as Maximo Oliveros, as the Bonsai Man, as the doctor in ICU Bed #7, student of Pisay, as a gangster from Tribu, as Gee-gee or as Waterina, etc.) Be creative! Take on the ramp! THE WORLD WILL BE WATCHING. Exciting prizes await the best cosplayers! DEADLINE FOR REGISTRATION IS ON JULY 8.

If you are interested, kindly register by e-mailing your name, contact number and the character that you will play to nikkidionisio@ yahoo.com. You may also contact Dominique Dionisio at 832-1125 loc. 1605 or Bing Tresvalles at 832-1125 loc. 1704.

Trendy, revolutionary

Since I first got hold of a Jasper Fforde novel, I noticed a growing trend in fiction. I don't know what it's called but you'd see fiction sections in bookstores growing volumes of works that retell classic stories, redevelop/reuse milieus, even fictionalize private lives of historic icons. (Fforde has a series about a detective, who jumps into stories of classics to go after anomalies like erring characters bent on changing narratives.)

I had this in my thoughts when I first browsed the Virgin Labfest 6 festival program and read on Floy Quintos' Suor Clara, the continuing story of Maria Clara, twenty plus years after she exited Noli Me Tangere. Initially, I saw myself attending six days of VLF6 as a journey towards watching Suor Clara. And this "journey" was fulfilled yesterday, on the fourth run of Set C or Pecado Mortal, VLF6's closing set.

What a fitting journey's end it was. It could be rather amusing as well, having my full course of VLF6 delightfully end with a "mortal sin". But I shouldn't be surprised; after all, it's an opus penned and directed by no less than a Floy Quintos, wonderfully performed by Frances Makil-Ignacio. I should probably add this to my "bragging rights," that I have attended college, shared learning space with such theater greatness as Ms. Makil-Ignacio. (Iskulmeyt ko ya'an!)

Fanciful and trendy as Suor Clara was, I however think the more important insight is that this work is revolutionary. When I was younger (so much younger than today), my elder sister would share some chismis about Maria Clara, Crisostomo Ibarra, Padre Salvi - sub-texts in Rizal's Noli bordering on the sensational fit for tabloids. Looking back, I realized the chismis took on the male point of view, either Ibarra's or Salvi's. Suor Clara is a wholly modern take on the story: it advanced down stage the woman's perspective that has illuminating brightness, a balance in gender discourse, and not some negative ridden femme fatale stereotype. It is modern but it does not alienate itself from its milieu; it's the 1896 Revolution after all.

All at once, the play's narrative brought back and synthesized some important concepts I've learned such as freedom in the context of closed settings as I remembered from mass communication Professor Varona's discussion on Schindler's List back in college. And also of female sexuality in the Scriptures, specifically Sr. Helen Graham's lectures in HAIN's Religion, Gender and Sexuality program (which also included the text of Songs of Songs). I've made a mental note on incorporating Suor Clara for any future lecture I'd have on Gender and Sexuality. Come to think of it, I think I'd rather look at my lecture notes now and take in all these wonderful ideas I've learned from VLF6, Suor Clara most definitely the centerpiece.

Last night, Eon and I were reflecting on this unusual devotion we have made for VLF6. We agreed, if we are ever to sum up VLF6's extraordinary significance, it would be about three women: Bing, Brandy and Suor Clara.

P.S. Set C or Pecado Mortal of Virgin Labfest 6 also included Sa Package Counter (Isa Borlaza) and Matyag (U.Z. Eliserio, Maynard Manansala and Chuckberry Pascual).

Baggage? Check.

Somewhere someone said that other than having two characters, the featured works of Set B or Pas de Deux of Virgin Labfest 6 shared nothing in common. In my reading there seemed to be. But before the blogging, I had to clarify "pas de deux". I knew it's something related to ballet (there are many French terms in ballet), and "deux" meant two (known to me courtesy of an Eighties soap commercial "une chantal, deux daphne, trois solange"). For quick fact check, Wikipedia.

Beyond the obvious two-character set-up of Pas de Deux - Higit Pa Dito (Allan Lopez), Collector's Item (Juliene Mendoza), Ondoy (Remi Velasco) - the narratives all had "baggage". The resulting communicative behavior around it BFF Eon splendidly fleshed out here.

With this set, I had a different kind of difficulty. Each story had something that spoke about and poked at my own past. If previous sets drained me emotionally like sharp jabs, this was a precise slash at the jugular.

I may be walking cliche, I have had my own son-to-mother moment - strange, it concerned my father, and much stranger, my mom also had an upright piano (Aray!). In high school, I was the oppressed nerd in one peer group, and an oppressor of nerdier nerds of another. Later, I'd also see myself in the unenviable role of wallflower friend cleaning up wreckages of others, unspoken adoration included (Aray! deux fois). In more recent past, in the domesticity I've co-created with my partner, we've had our share of ugly confrontations made uglier by economic strife. Yes, even the deal-breaker rhetoric.

As in pas de deux, two people will eventually reach a "coda", a finale that brings each other again face to face. What now? In VLF6 Set B, three options were offered: rearrange and start anew; sever and "kill"; or continue engagement (ugly or otherwise) until either first or second option become necessary. Truth being far stranger, real-life pas de deux does not resolve in one act.

Sucker for love

Just like Ambeth Ocampo, in one of his articles, where he said he had to consult a dictionary for the word "plebeian" for an expository on Bonifacio, I looked up on "pariah" to start weaving my way into blogging Set A or Pariah Paraiso of Virgin Labfest 6. Later in the writing struggle, I realized, the denotation didn't matter.

In what shone brightest for me, Balunbalunan, Bingibingihan (Debbie Ann Tan) was indeed Paradise, one hidden along the margins of society. It reflected de-/reconstruction of love, one not easily apparent to the bigoted mainstream eye, but nevertheless celebratory of this universal abstract's essence. I fully related to this: I myself share love as it exists along the margins.

There may be two things to remember about this reconstruction of love: one, it may lack articulation but is well understood within one's chalk circle (no matter how big or small-er), and two, other people, even like pariahs may never fully understand. I have to admit that many times, even with my friends, I don't fully understand.

They may see pity when it's a faithful offering. They may see opportunism when it's purpose driven. They may see meaningless suffering when it's loving sacrifice. Under a fading spotlight, I continued to see Gilbeys' and Brandy's embrace bright, shining, sparkling. They were in Paradise, never mind the wreckage all around. (It helped that the roles were carried out by magnificos Bembol Roco and Missy Maramara.)

It was a pleasant realization to have witnessed a demonstration of a heterosexual love relationship that's nowhere trapped in heterosexist mold. Even some of my gay friends couldn't grow out of that. (Wouldn't?)

Should there be future chitchat on VLF6, if ever I'm given opportunity to do the angling, I think I will always take off from this opus. The important message is in this one and I don't have to lay on the big words. I could always say, well, I'm just a sucker for love.

P.S. Other works staged in this Set included Isagani (Alexis Dorola Yasuda) and Bakit Wala Nang Nagtatagpo Sa Philcoa Oberpas (Carlo Pacolor Garcia).

What's the flava?

There could be several reasons why I had difficulty relating to the featured works in Set E or Banyaga Twinbill of Virgin Labfest 6. I've listed them down. But as I thought more about each reason, I'd have "then-again" ponders, which tell me that one reason is not entirely the whole truth behind my difficulty.

Reason 1: They're foreign. The plays, Sundan Natin Si Eversan (Shungiku Uchida) and 3some (Joned Suryatmoko), were penned by foreigners. Then again, Eversan was actually about Filipino migrant workers, and the student activism glory days relived in 3some was not too different from how it was when I was in college.

Reason 2: There's a generation gap. The language of manga, allegedly one of Eversan's playwright's expertise, is not something I grew up with. Then again, my hunny (who's older than I am) was able to orient me on anime and manga language, him being within professional provenance of the animation industry. While not all the time, I did get what many visual messages meant.

Reason 3: I'm generally conservative. While not totally naive about threesome encounters (once, just once!), the set-up context in Suryatmoko's work confounded me. I wore the duncecap in defensive mode: I understood the stake-claiming and bragging about one's glory days of fighting the system, but in this scene, what was all the exchange for? Foreplay? I couldn't hear the sexual undertone. Maybe it's because of...

Reason 4: I'm not heterosexual. Who knows what's going on in the mind of this straight dude cruising in the Internet for a male third wheel; he's plain weird, said I, proud homeowner in the gay ghetto. Then again, I did get the gender sub-text of the emasculating sex-libbed female (just got slightly miffed that empowered female sexuality still had to be visualized as cigarette-smoking, red-lipped, loudly confrontational, all-over-the-place.)

I did gain insight about coming out heterosexual. I appreciated problematizing the popular notion about straights never having to come out. Sexual orientation is a world of personal meaning regardless. I also marveled at the quiet composure of a straight male character over his knowledge of a partner's infidelities - it's usually a role assigned to the suffering wife.

Even so, Banyaga Twinbill, in the end was like some exotically conjured hotel gourmet: it has unique flavor appeal but lacked the sweetness, saltiness or MSG-laced additive, which may be unhealthy but chemically inducing. Maybe there's a reason five: I'm really just an amateur with this theater stuff.

P.S. There is actually reason six: from time to time I got distracted, thanks to Eon's swooning and BFF confessed it here.

Beautiful ugliness

The second time I got the chance to see Virgin Labfest 6 at the CCP was for Set F, three of allegedly the best of Labfest 5: Isang Araw sa Karnabal (Nicolas Pichay), Boy-Gel ang Gelpren ni Mommy (Sheilfa Alojamiento) and Doc Resureccion, Gagamutin ang Bayan (Layeta Bucoy). Three very different approaches in terms of staging and ensemble but similar in evoking emotional perplexities in the audience. Eon and I went home feeling drained of emotions.

Choosing from the spectacles of a roller coaster horror ride, badminton swordplay and generous banters of invectives, I was more personally struck heart and mind by Bucoy's work. Maybe because we've just gotten through the elections ourselves. Most likely also because of the four national elections I've participated, this last one proved to be most difficult in making decisions. I only voted for a president, vice president (on the last minute), and four senators. Except for one senatorial, none of my choices won.

After the stagings, I told Eon that probably the amount of heaviness one would feel after experiencing Bucoy's Doc Resureccion depends on how much one also would "believe" in its reality (real-ness). As an afterthought, the quality of the heaviness one would feel could also depend on which subjectivity one chooses to be most offended by.

Clearly not a narrative which "celebrates" something, I think it's relatively fair to herald the Bucoy opus based on things a viewer would be repulsed by. The story could offend one's values on family-centeredness: What sort of a man could Pogi be (even his family) to forsake life of kin over the bribery of an unseen trapo reelectionist? Or it could offend one's perspective over the personal/parochial nature of a Filipino voter: What sort of a candidate could Doc be to express politico-verbosity such as "genuine" concern for the downtrodden and yet deny and reject his own childhood of misfortune? Or maybe one could also take a "high" human-to-ants point of view and remark how these people don't realize better things coming their way simply because they couldn't see beyond their immediate hungers. ("Oh, you people!")

Add all this to the other plays' narratives - women's rights backdropped by politics of human rights violence, and parenthood backdropped by gender dynamics of male privilege and same-sexual relationships - how's that for emotional perplexity? Courtesy of three one-act plays. I went to bed that night heaving a sigh, "Now THAT was one hell of a roller coaster horror ride."