blackshama's commentary on Philippine issues

Di masasabing hindi ka mamamtay sa katatawa sa pelikulang Zombadings: Patayin sa shokot si Remington na ngayo'y palabas pa rin sa mga sinehan. Sa pamagat ng komedya, ang salitang "shokot" ay marahil nagmula sa "shock" at "takot". Isang katagang nanggaling sa "gayspeak" nag karoon ng ibayong ibig sabihin ang bagong kataga. Ngayon nasa balita ang kaso ng isang sikyo na sinuntok daw ng isang congressman or representante ng isang distrito sa Mindanao sa UP Ayala Technohub ng kinailangan para sa seguridad na suriin ang sasakyan ng congresista. Hindi daw itutuloy ng sikyo ang reklamo dahil isa lamang siyang maliit na tao. Si pelikulang Pinoy, may mga sinasabing "memorable" na eksena ng mga "maliit na tao" na lumaban. Kasama na dito ang ginampanan ni FPJ na isang maliit na police sergeant sa "Kapag Puno na ang Salop" laban sa di makakalimutang Judge (na ginampanan ni Eddie Garcia). Hay naku napuno na nga ang salop. K...

Thanks to Karate Kid 2010 , starring Will Smith's chip off the old block Jaden Smith and Kung Fu Artist and Hollywood Star Jackie Chan, everyone in America [most especially in Hollywood] and on Planet Earth knows that China is THE SUPERPOWER. It's obvious from the plot. Motortown USA is now a dump and an African American single mother has to move to China to work for a car plant [probably that famous European brand bought by the Mainland Taipans last year]. She says to son Dre Parker "There is nothing left for us in Detroit. This [Beijing] is home!" [Filipinos should read that as "There is no future left in America. This [Asia a.k.a. China] is the FUTURE!] The movie promotes Air China and shows China's Olympic status symbols, the Bird's Nest, tall office towers, busy streets, fast cars and of course the touristic staples of the Forbidden City, Great Wall, Guilin's Karst Landscape and a real Shaolin temple. Unlike in the original 1984 Karate Kid starr...

I have finished my treat of DVD for review movies. "Australia" is billed as a tribute to the "golden age" of movies. The opening credits however reminded me of Indiana Jones. Nonetheless the Baz Luhrmann film has proven the wags wrong. The film is no Outback Waterworld! Anyway the film lives up to its Aussieness. There are a lot of Australian private jokes in the movie and only blokes and sheilas who have lived long enough in Oz can get the punchline. Example 1: all newbies to Oz are enthralled to see hopping kangaroos. The ooooohs and ahhhs I have heard in Billabong sanctuary years before. But then something typically Aussie happens to the roo. Guess!?!? (Clue: When I first landed in Australia when I was an overseas student there, the first roo I saw in Oz was a roadkill.) Example 2: Also when Nicole Kidman's aristocratic character goes down the gangplank and into the wharf, she tries to check into a "hotel", where in Oz a hotel is a pub. She walks r...

No te olvideras is the the whole message of historical -romances- in- war movies like Mark Meily's Baler (VIVA films). It seems that every decade there is a big budgeted Pinoy Spanish era movie. Ten years ago we had Marilou Diaz-Abaya's Rizal (GMA Films). So those who saw it then can't help but compare Baler with Rizal . But that is where the comparison ends. Rizal is a hagiography with certain liberties taken while Baler is a love story with extreme liberties taken. Now one wag who happens to be gay once said on ANC TV when asked which is the most notable film of the last 30 years " Rizal is the most beautiful ugly movie made!" (Bernal's Himala was the best movie ever) I'm sure this movie critic cum wag will say the same thing if not worse! I saw Baler in the same Ayala cinema I saw Rizal ten years earlier. Worst of all since I bought my ticket quite late, I found myself in the same crummy seat from where I saw Rizal ! Baler can be forgiven for ...

I rarely get to watch movies these days primarily due to the cost of a theatre ticket and that I have no spare time. So I choose the films I watch. But even then I recall the movies I have seen by some memorable lines. Everyone recalls the famous line in Empire Strikes Back and the first Star Wars movie "A New Hope" "The Force be with You" Darth Vader: Luke I am your father. Luke: Noooooooooo! and the most memorable lines in world cinema history "Bond, James Bond" or Clark Gable's Rhett Butler "Frankly my dear, I don't give a damn!" But Pinoy movies have their own memorable lines as immortal as those spoken in Hollywood. The Sharon Cuneta-Cherie Gil exchange in "Bituing walang Ningning" is part of Pinoy pop iconography "You're nothing but a second-rate, trying hard copycat!” It has been parodied many times like Nora Aunor's climatic lines in Asia's top film of all time "Himala" “Walang himala! Ang him...

My father was the man who took me to see the first Star Wars movie (it was I think June 22, 1977, Star Wars fan can correct me is if I am wrong, I think it was at the first few screenings) at the old Circle theatre on Timog Avenue Quezon City. My mother wasn't inclined to see a "war movie" so it became a father and son bonding moment. The rest of Asia had to wait a year after.But according to the Inquirer , Japan is the most Star Wars mad country on earth. I wouldn't be surprised, many aspects of the Star Wars universe has its inspiration from Japanese culture. Darth Vader's helmet is obviously a sort of kabuto and those light sabres are nothing but shinai. I think watching the "Wars" is the reason why I took to kendo when I was a boy. I had Luke Skywalker fantasies that later would be doused when the Empire Struck Back. When I learned that Darth was Luke's dad, I know that fantasy was silly. Dad was no Darth Vader. By then I had spent time in Japan...

I first saw the Indiana Jones movies as a high school student. Seeing Harrison Ford in the Indy movies was a refreshing change from his Han Solo character of the then Star Wars trilogy. Of course the formula was similar. As the www.ihatestarwars.com once had it in 1999 (when the prequels came out,one by one), Indiana Jones is nothing but Han Solo battling Nazis. (BTW, the ihatestarwars site has been off the web) Indiana Jones was a "tenured professor of archaeology". The prof had a PhD and can have all that adventures in exotic digs. That would attract UP Diliman campus brats (our parents were academics with PhDs) to consider having a career in academe. But in reality academe is a tad more boring. UP has an archaeological studies programme and I haven't known its director Victor Paz wearing a fedora! Of course the original three movies 20 years ago were more fun. We were "cold war kids who were hard to kill" as Billy Joel sang about and the "Lost Ark...

Afghanistan's recent history is a tale of tragedy. The Kite Runner,a film directed by Marc Foster from the novel by Afghan writer Khaled Hosseini beautifully and poignantly captures this tragedy. According to people who have been there, Afghanistan is a beautiful country. It is hard to comprehend that such a place is the stage of a tragedy. (The movie was shot in China but you can be forgiven for believing that it was in Kabul) The tragedy is religious fundamentalism. This cuts across the characters in the film. The kites which represented Afghanistan's tradition and the innocence of its children were put down, their strings cut. But fundamentalism doesn't guarantee sinlessness but more hideous sins. The movie deals with child abuse and rape, but that isn't even mentioned in the film but the truth is extremely odious. Afghanistan's tragedy is a result of the cold war games of the Russians and the Americans. The Soviets are gone and America is at war with the mujahed...

Commemoration of the Mendiola Massacre The Mendiola Massacre protesters tried to march to that bridge over the estero only to be met with police with placards with the non-violence message. The lefties cried foul and "psy war"! Well the fossilized ideologues of the CPP-NDF and its fronts don't have the monopoly on placards. Fascists or anyone for that matter can make them too. Also the commie fossils have to realize that how to do psy war isn't just found in Mao's Little Red Book or in " Philippine Society and Revolution". Ha ha ha! The lefties got a dose of their own medicine! Heath Ledger dies Aussie Actor Heath Ledger was found dead on Jan 23 in his New York flat apparently of a drug overdose. Ledger's performance as a gay cowboy in "Brokeback Mountain" was amazing and this was his ticket to Hollywood stardom. Ledger was nominated for the 2005 Oscar Best Actor only to lose to Philip Seymour Hoffman who portrayed Truman Capote. We will...

What could happen if you brew a mixture of fantasy, Oxbridge philosophy, the English Residential College, Gnosticism, New Age and talking animals doing theology in a movie? Answer: a headache. Pope Benedict XVI doesn't rail against movies as he respects the autonomy of the arts. But the movie has generated controversy since some Catholics say that the movie alludes to organized religion (read as Roman Catholicism) and how it "controls" minds. After all who would be cheeky enough to call the villainous organization in the movie as "Magisterium"? What organizations on heaven and earth use the word "Magisterium" in its official documents? Answers: The Roman Catholic Church and the Evolution Church of Stephen Jay Gould! Nonetheless putting some theology in a fantasy isn't new. CS Lewis did it in "Narnia" but he took care to couch it as purely metaphors and allegories. Thus the atheist could tune out of "Narnia" and just relish th...

The erstwhile computer geek has been made a hero (by saving the US of A from a major computer crash and terrorist attack) in the latest and most unbelievable Bruce Willis starrer "Die Hard 4.0". This heroic geek is played by Justin Long as Matt Farell. Of course if you have a geek as the savior of America you must have a geek as the Evil one Who's Name is Legion convincingly played by Timothy Olyphant as dumped national security consultant Thomas Gabriel. I have nothing against computer geeks. They have a niche in our society. But what I don't like about this latest movie dished out by Hollywood is that geeks are stereotyped once more. Geeks are portrayed as uncoordinated and bumbling in the movie except the evil geek whose cold moves may strike terror in the viewer. Another evil geek is a female named Mai Linh played by Hawaiian Asian-American actress Maggie Q. This female geek is a martial artist. Well Asian women have been stereotyped once more. One fat geek called...

Finally, we have a fairly balanced orthodox Bible film. While some people may think Mel Gibson's "Passion" was faithful to scripture, the material for the film was taken from a German nun's private revelation. I never planned to see "Nativity", thinking it was one of those hagiographic dishes Hollywood cooks up from time to time. But I saw the traffic yesterday afternoon and I decided to cool off at a mall cinema. I wasn't disappointed. The movie is a new treatment of a traditional theme. OK. The movie producers did not offend traditional Christian (read Catholic and Protestant) sensibilities. The producers did not have to cook up gimmicks like having a scene where Joseph and Mary fulfill their marital duties (offensive to Catholics) or the Holy Couple kissing (offensive to Protestants and Catholics). Instead we see a young couple who are in love. Catholics are reared on an image of the Holy Family, but when I was a kid, I never thought Mary and Joseph...