The Daily Tribune <<< Without Fear or Favor >>>

»HEADLINES

»NATION

BIYAHENG LUPA: Meditation on

LIVING and DYING

By Edgar O. Cruz, Contributor

10/18/2009

“At the end of the road looms death, nullifying all we had invested while alive. But should we fall into despair? Or appreciate that one life? After all, we can find meaning in how we engage life. And life is not me but us, not isolation but engagement, not next travel but this travel.” – Bing Lao, filmmaker

Biyaheng Lupa (Soliloquy) is Armando “Bing” Lao’s first directorial work where he takes filmmaking beyond real time to an ultimate level of narrative expression: Poetic time.

For many award-winning filmmakers who consider him as their mentor, Bing’s first film is a historic event, and he does not fall short with Biyaheng Lupa. In this Quantum Films production, he takes the art of filmmaking as an independent artist working on a tight budget and near impossible principal production conditions — inside a moving bus where naturally occurring magic is bound to happen.

A great Filipino film comes forth — a meditation on the dichotomy of living and dying.

A group of passengers takes a long distance trip from the urban jungle of Quezon City toward Legazpi City where the majestic Mayon Volcano is found. The full-length feature opens with an aerial shot of the mighty splendid sleeper. It lets the claustrophobic movie breathe before it asphyxiates.

Who’s on board

Pepe (Allan Paule) is the bus conductor. Aboard are passengers from different walks of life, each one with an absorbing story to tell: Helen (Jaclyn Jose), a married woman having an affair; Alex (Julio Diaz), an unsuccessful multilevel marketing newbie; Kardo (Peping Almojuela), an old court interpreter still haunted by the death of his wife and son; and Jinky (Andoy Ranay), a loud homosexual who gets smitten with the intense Obet (Coco Martin), a young man who is running away from filial duty.

Then there’s Fina (Shamaine Centenera), who has regrets about her marriage; Cora (Susan Africa), who is still in mourning; Irene (Eugene Domingo), who is about to leave her son for a menial job abroad; Lilian (Angel Aquino), the town gossip in patient search for true love; Anabel (Mercedes Cabral), a superstitious pregnant girl; Micky (Carlo Guevarra), a young deaf-mute visiting his mother’s tomb; Grandma Paz (Mely Soriano), who has just been released from prison for drug pushing; Danny (Archie Adamos), a hedonist intending to borrow money; and Becky (Isabel de Leon), a young female who finds a friend on her way to a funeral.

But the movie’s most important character is nameless and unseen in the film except for his moving hands — yes, the invincible bus driver. He symbolizes destiny because he controls the lives of the passengers by bringing them toward their destination. He acts as a God-like figure who brings the passengers to a physical place (Legazpi) or a state (death).

What happens

The bus gets stoned, an unlikely romance develops, mangoes are given out, a love song elicits tears, a man’s butterfly knife — and then a real butterfly — cause commotion, an incriminating photograph gets lost... This is a journey they will never forget. In just a single ride, Biyaheng Lupa vividly chronicles the inner lives of ordinary people as they grapple with issues of life and love... and death.

Through a stream of consciousness (SoC) style, author-helmer Bing reveals one character via his/her random thoughts. The narrative hook is longitudinal, meaning it focuses on one character only. The thinking is one day only, but thoughts cover a whole life. Turning into a cross-sectional SoC, the narrative jumps from one character thought to another. Individual slice of life turns into a collective film, revealing the sociology of one whole people.

This movie breaks many beloved conventions in filmmaking: No lead stars, no vida or contravida, no spoken word, no skin exposure, no violence except the asked-for but unseen jaw jabbing by Obet on the peeping Jinky (also unseen), incidental stone-throwing, and Alex’s outburst with his balisong, which could have turned deadly if inner voices had not calmed him down. Location is also incidental just like in real life. But they manage to be involving, as real to the character concerned as to the viewer.

Using the life stories of real people culled from interviews of bus passengers, Bing’s main accomplishment is the use of poetic time. After Bing makes real time as the reason of award-winning films from Jeffrey Jeturian’s Kubrador (Bet Collector) to Brillante Mendoza’s Kinatay of Cannes film fest fame, he uses it in a poetic method so masterfully that even the magic comes so real.

With figures of speech as visual poetic devices, the concept of poetic time is evident: The accident’s voiceover montage represents the Greek chorus. The butterfly’s appearance is personification. It is foreshadowing when someone ad-libs, “Sino kayang mamamatay?”

The sky cutaways are invocation; the music video singing, annotation. The wharf is metaphor for “marriage is a long walk together,” and Mercedes’s chanting, onomatopeia. The children almost run over by the bus at the same time as Peping’s dream, mirroring or rhyming.

The missing photo and the Legazpi/Manila signages in the Naga station are suasoria; the facial repetition, twin girls, twin boys and the deaf cemetery caretaker, reiteration. When the bus is stoned at without breaking the glass but the stone passes through, it is absurdity. Mercedes’ squid birth is faux ami (false experience); the sound effects of jet taking off for Eugene, resolution and prolepsis.

Julio, the salesman, ends up buying the balisong, and that is simple irony. When the dog barks as Julio disembarks, it is synesthesia (Emotional mood reinforced by perceptual channel). Angel’s suitcase is metonymy (part for whole).

The film’s highlight is the effective use of the contemporary music video with the archaic Greek chorus. From Nico Antonio’s singing of “Kahit Isang Saglit” in a music video from the front-of-bus video system, it proceeds to collective singing, the film’s fulcrum that unifies the diverse passengers. Then it shifts as a Greek chorus by commenting on the stoning of the bus, hitting the conductor. Angel and Alan is the scene while the passengers are the Greek chorus. The VO montage becomes an audal Greek chorus as it comments on the scene of Angel sprawled on the floor.

Where it leads

Because of the superlative screenplay and direction, all roles come out balanced and compelling as interpreted by the competent cast. There’s no single great acting, to the full-length feature’s credit. Perhaps the best way to measure them is to have favorite characters, not actors, and these will have to be based on those actors who gave the most self-identification. This is another of Bing’s accomplishments, which, as any filmmaker would agree, is an extremely difficult accomplishment.

All other production values (production design by Jesus Lozada, cinematography by Ogi Sugatan, music by Gian Gianan, sound design by Ditoy Aguila, live sound by Nolet Clemente, editing by Jay Halili) are equally exceptional. Special effects, for example, are not computed-generated nor attention grabbers. They just happen right in your face and will likely be understood only by perceptive viewers. Singling any of them out is doing injustice to individual parts and the whole. This is a most intelligent movie without appearing as such. It’s as if Bing designed the movie this way to break down all moviemaking conventions dear to us.

Biyaheng Lupa is a master work in filmmaking. An blame-free exposition on the contradictions of life that turn into confirmations upon learning how to deal: simple and deep, plain and complex, individual and collective, free will and destiny, living and dying. This is what divides and departs Biyaheng Lupa from Filipino films before it: While it remains strictly Filipino without debasing us as a people like Lino Brocka’s squatter and macho dancer movies and Brillante’s gutter life flicks, it stays universal, honoring the human spirit with no prospect other than death.

Bing says it best in the director’s statement: “At the end of the road looms death, nullifying all we had invested while alive. But should we fall into despair? Or appreciate that one life? After all, we can find meaning in how we engage life. And life is not me but us, not isolation but engagement, not next travel but this travel.”

There seems to be one flaw in this trip: All passengers look like movie stars. Is it because we know they are? In the US, they think the likes of Gina Pareño and Cherry Pie Picache are not professional actors. Could it be for cinematic purposes, to be esthetically pleasing due to the many close-up shots dictated by the limited space? Most likely. Bing also probably intended them to symbolize that beauty can be good and evil.

No matter, Bing turns full circle in Biyaheng Lupa, that film is not the written but the visual experience. He converts the award-winning filmmaker trio of Lao-Jeffrey Jeturian-lawyer Joji Alonso into a duet by taking on the role of screenwriter-director. This is Joji’s most realized film production to date, taking the lessons of Minsan Pa and Kubrador to a new artistic peak, and Filipino films to a creative high.

Echoing Orson Wells’ Citizen Kane, Biyaheng Lupa marks a milepost in Philippine cinema. It will find its rightful spot in global cinema.

Biyaheng Lupa (Soliloquy) will have its world premiere tomorrow, Oct. 19, at the ongoing 11th Cinemanila International Film Festival’s Digital Lokal Competition in Taguig City at Cinema 6 of Market! Market! at 8 p.m.