My primary social media site (aka Facebook) is currently buzzing with good reviews about Heneral Luna. I finally got to see it the week after it came out, after a scare that it will be pulled out of cinemas (more on that later).
This post is part review, part musings of a girl who has grown up reading Ambeth Ocampo's essays on history. I begin with this memorable quote from the movie. "Inggles-in pa naman ako sa sarili kong bansa, punyeta!"
The movie was undoubtedly good. I'm not a critic seasoned by experience, and neither am I an arts major. I am only a humble enthusiast in history, Ambeth Ocampo, and good movies.
To my shame, I have only watched a few Filipino movies in my life. However, it's because I am also a very picky moviegoer. I also refuse to torrent movies, and I refuse to watch the melodramatic, absurd drivel that Filipino movie industries churn out by the dozen these days. The Filipino films I've watched are--bar one--all indie films, the ones that are shown yearly in the university (special thanks to those who bring Sining-sine to UP Manila!).
However, Heneral Luna struck a chord in me. I am not the nationalistic type who wears her ideologies on her sleeve, but nevertheless, I am proud of my Filipino heritage. Never mind that my surname is inherently Spanish and that I have Spanish and Chinese blood in my veins. I was born and bred in the Philippines, I speak the vernacular. I walk through Manila's dirty streets five times a week. I studied Philippine History (and am taking a History 4 course this semester), along with the Philippine Institution 100.
I have read accounts of the American occupation in the Philippines, and this movie gave it justice. Watching the movie made me realize how we need to alter our America-friendly textbooks. Our "white brothers" who treated Filipinos as nothing more than acquisitions are misrepresented in school textbooks. I remember a teacher who taught us that the Americans were our "saviors"--maybe they were, maybe they weren't. However, the movie showed the American occupation right after the treaty of Paris, a time when the American soldiers were first establishing their foothold in a country that was new to them.
To my surprise, I found myself weeping as the first half hour of the film showed Filipino soldiers dying under fire of the Americans. It was not blind sentiment at a few lives lost on screen, but some sort of nationalistic feeling, an appreciation for the tribute that those soldiers of long ago gave to the country.
It was amazing how the film had its parallels in modern-day Philippines--amazing, and saddening. That there are those people in power who would put their own gain before the country's and their countrymen is a truth--and it is a truth that endures even now.
* * *
The painstaking amount of detail to get the historical facts right gave it a two thumbs up from me. Antonio Luna was a hot-headed general, a hero who was not universally liked, but stuck to his own ideals. I cannot say that I am fond of people who, in pursuing their ideals, forge through other people's rights and principles, but it made John Arcilla's portrayal of Luna real and three-dimensional. This was not a typical movie guy whom everyone was forced to like, who was sickeningly sweet and rose to overcome the odds that the circumstances of life gave him. He had his quirks, his temper was short, and his mustache was impeccably kept. I expected him to step out of the silver screen at any moment, such was the realism that the character possessed.
Heneral Luna is truly a masterpiece, in every aspect of film that I can think of. If I ever have children, this would be the one film that I would make them watch. It was more than beautiful. It was real--or, rather, it evoked something real within me.
*Heneral Luna is a Filipino film by director Jerrold Tarog.
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