Temptation Lessons

Much has been said about the movie Temptation Island. This classic camp-de-force by Joey Gosiengfiao is a tale of four finalists in the Miss Manila Sunshine beauty contest. Their pleasure cruise turns tragic as an explosion rips the ship apart. The four, along with a maid, a waiter, a gay socialite and his bourgeois boyfriend, and an admirer of one of the contestants are shipwrecked on a deserted dessert island.

The ever-witty Jessica Zafra wrote an excellent article about this movie. Since she did an exceptional job I will not even try to top her efforts. Instead, I will borrow Marlon’s idea and list down the lessons one can get from watching the movie:

[1] Bring your own set of “wheels” when attending a party for more impact. To quote Suzanne: “Late entrance, early exit. Yan ang dramatic!” Use a charcoal-grey Mercedes.

[2] The more expensive and bigger the cake, the more likely it’ll be dropped. And the ones who tripped and dropped the cake will end up with icing on their faces.

[3] If you dance to Giorgio Moroder’s song What A Night!, bad luck will follow. They were dancing to that song when the ship caught fire and exploded. They were dancing to that song when the women engaged in a slap-fest. That song is cursed.

[4] One can use pantyhose to catch fish.

[5] Straight men will hook up with a gay person in case of dire need, usually economic. But when faced with death, straight guys will choose a woman over a gay person.

[6] Gays save the day. The gay Joshua died in order to provide food for the others.

[7] You cannot escape your lot in life. When the waiter cooked the remains of Joshua and served them to the others, the irrepressible Suzanne quipped, “Once a waiter, always a waiter.”

[8] To make cannibalism palatable, one should sing “Somewhere” from West Side Story after eating. “There’s a place for us, somewhere a place for us….”

[9] Lack of food and water will make sexy women hallucinate a giant ice cream, a giant fried chicken and a clearing full of umbrellas and electric fans. In all those hallucinations the women remain sexy and poised as always.

[10] Corollary to the previous lesson, shipwrecked beauty contestants always look sexy and daring, even when dying of hunger, thirst and exhaustion.

If you want to spend 2 hours of mind-numbing fun with a smattering of bitchy dialogue, watch Temptation Island. Available in VCD. (The VCD cover inaccurately credits Al Tantay as a cast member but he’s nowhere to be found. Maybe he was wiser than the rest of the cast and skipped the shoot.)