And I Saw Pink

I went on a movie binge this Saturday. At the Pink Film Festival at Megamall I watched two documentaries by Nick de Ocampo, Happy Together by Wong Kar-Wai, and Hamilton McLeod’s inter.m@tes all in one day.

Of the two documentaries, what struck me was Nick’s 20-year old film Oliver which showed the life of a gay live performer. At the end of the film Oliver performed his famous “spider-man” act: he shoved this bundle of very long string inside his ass and tied one end on stage. He then “danced” all over the place, mimicking a spider’s movement while slowly uncoiling the string from inside his ass, much like a spider spinning her web. It’s an amazing sight to behold: Oliver would coil the string all over the stage—around beams, on the wings, on strategically placed nails all over the place—while dancing to pulsating music. In the end, he got entangled in his own web, a metaphor for how poverty had trapped him to that lifestyle.

I saw Happy Together on the big screen years before in another film festival. What amazed me in this film was Tony Leung’s performance—he transformed himself so completely that years later I didn’t realize that it was also him who played the lead in “In The Mood For Love” and “Hero”. The late Leslie Cheung was also radiant as Tony’s amoral and immature lover.

I was most interested in watching inter.m@tes because it was co-written, produced and directed by a Brit but the movie is situated in Manila and stars some of the more underrated Filipino actors both on screen and stage. Plus, the script was written and shot in English, so I wanted to know how our local actors fared in that department.

The negative points first: some of our actors are lousy in English and it shows, glaringly so. I even suspect Simon Ibarra’s and William Theo’s lines were dubbed by others. They were both so uncomfortable speaking the Queen’s English, their acting became too deliberate, too self-conscious. It didn’t help that the dubbing of their lines was too haphazard; it further emphasized how inadequate their grasp of spoken English.

The use of English was also a curious choice. They could have gotten better performances had the script been in Filipino. Plus some of the lines were too contrived: Toby Alejar’s character utters the line, “If he had enough chutzpa to steal ______ from ______....” I mean, who the hell uses the word “chutzpa” in a conversation?

The English lines hampered some of the actors’ performances; they seemed like they’re from another world. But the others benefited from this.

Ian Veneracion was a revelation. Clearly he was very comfortable speaking in English. His portrayal of an amoral, unapologetic, partner-hopping, closeted action star was so fearless and on the dot. It’s a measure of his achievement that while I was consciously admiring his actor’s skills, I was also convinced that I was watching his character. If I had the power I’d nominate him for Best Actor in this role.

Migui Moreno also turned in a fine performance (but the dubbing was spotty in places). And he had better command of his Filipino-English, so his acting was more natural. The scene in the car where Ian was trying to get Migui to go down on him was priceless—humor, tension and pathos seamlessly ping-ponging from one to the other and back.

Raymond Bagatsing also speaks English well, but his portrayal of an effeminate photographer was a little too deliberate and self-conscious.

Over-all the movie was spotty, and the portrayal of gays on the Internet almost a caricature at times. But some fine, humorous performances helped liven up this movie.