Category Archives: movies

movies

serbis lashing

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wow. the reviews for serbis are hot! scalding hot! except for a few, all the reviews are negative! hahaha one even went on to write, “What’s the worst so far? That’s easy. It’s Philippine director Brillante Mendoza’s “Serbis.” another wrote “overall thumbs down to Serbis, a shambolic picture of life in a Filipino porn cinema.” and my last post on serbis is filled with comments berating on bing lao being a brocka relic and dante’s supposed unoriginality. carlo and i were involved in the making of serbis (design part, not the writing) and this doesnt discount the fact that we are part and parcel of it. rather unfortunate for dante though that this film is getting worldwide lashing from critics and audiences mainly because since it’s on cannes, most everybody gets to see it and comment. otherwise, indie movies like this would have only generated curses from a few horny curious movie patrons at some sleazy cinema in recto who are just waiting to get serviced. how ironic haha

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movies

Serbis competes in Cannes

Brillante’s Serbis competes in Cannes
FUNFARE By Ricardo F. Lo
Thursday April 24, 2008

BREAKING NEWS: Director Brillante “Dante” Mendoza’s next film, Serbis, has been officially invited to the official competition section of the 61st Cannes Film Festival from May 14 to 25.

>This piece of good news was relayed at around 1:30 yesterday morning by Christian Jeune, director of Cannes’ Film Department, to Dante and producer Ferdinand Lapuz who just came from a preview of the rough copy of the film with executives of a major film distributor who flew in from Hong Kong.

The official announcement was made during a press conference in Cannes yesterday.

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filmmaking, movies

TIRADOR Philippine Premiere!

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For those who miss out on films by Mendoza, take note of his latest masterwork, Tirador (Slingshot) an intimate glimpse into the lives of criminals who have to deal with police raids and other hardships on the gritty streets of Manila. The film has already been picking up speed in film festivals, including Toronto, Dubai and the US. Filipino viewers will have their day as TIRADOR premieres at the UP Film Institute on Dec 3, 2007. The film stars Jiro Manio, Nathan Lopez, Kristoffer King, Coco Martin and veteran stars Julio Diaz and Jaclyn Jose.

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Slingshot (Tirador) dir. Brillante Mendoza; Philippines, 2007. 86 minutes
Opens December 3, 2007 UP Film Institute

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filmmaking, movies, travel

visit to caramoan

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pic by neil daza. cheers!

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visited caramoan island in camsur bicol a few weeks ago for a location check for the film. we brazenly took to the 8 hour road trip and hopped on a 1.5hour bangka ride to “shorten” our trip, that eventually got us at casa del roa by 11am the next day, almost 13 hours after we left manila. we then had to proceed to gota beach and get on another bangka to see the islands including honongan, lahos, matukad and tayak.

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caramoan is beautiful. too bad when i got back last weekend to start work on the preparations for the film’s shoot this week, i learned that they clean-shaved the island forests in time for survivor asia’s leg here in the philippines in february. so what we saw of lush jungle forests set against the limestone rocky mountains in the middle of clear blue waters are no longer existing.

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ergo hindi na pwede pang shoot! on top of that, the weather forecasts tell of thunderstorms and a low depression area in the vicinity and most likely a storm on its way. around 12hours after we arrived on camsur this weekend, we get a text from the line producer that the shoot there is packed-up and postponed indefinitely. and that we had to hurry back to manila immediately. good luck.

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movies, musings

preparations 1

update. i am ngarag. yeah. what else is new?

preparations have been grueling and the shoot day challenges are like a soldier’s at battle. try going into war with a knife, not a sword or a bayonet or an automatic rifle, just a knife that you borrowed from your neighbor’s cuzin. and you could only afford to buy a piece of cloth to wrap the handle so the bare metal wouldnt cut your fingers off.

and the battle wages on. sulong mga kapatid. more updates when i have time. that would come around november. hehehe cheers!

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art & design, filmmaking, movies

official news i guess

it’s official and im gonna write about it.

was offered to work as PD for chito roño’s new horror film.  that got me scared shit.  direk chito is one of the industry’s biggest directors, and the most demanding.  i wouldnt know if i could handle the stress!  but i realized this would be the 3rd time a chito film offer passed through my hands.  ive been asked to work with him before (one film for london, another for something else).  feelings of inadequacy or just being plain terrified to be berated on set would have to be conquered. opportunity is not a lazy visitor (so says cinderella from “into the woods”).  so i accepted the project  🙂

i did survive our first day of shoot though. yey! shoot was just 1 scene, 4 shots, 1 location and featured assunta making her architectural and fengshui presentation.  1 down, 29 shooting days to go.

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artdept staff on first day high: deans, carlo, ben, lola fer and jopay.

the Lord is my shepherd; though i cross through the shadows of the valley of death i will fear no evil.  after the movie i hope i wont be reduced to a sliver of a soul, an imprint of digital shit. haha.

one day at a time please ! yey

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movies, music, musings

long play finds

jesus christ superstar ost toured my sister mamati and her husband papi to marikina shoe expo.  after saying hi to poninski at black soup, we scoured the thrift shops and was excited to find a long play copy (plaka) of jesus christ superstar in heritage. unfortunately the p500 tag price was way too much and i snuck it back where i got it and cursed the place.

in the next shop i found another copy of the lp and immediately bought it for p150.  although it was i believe the most expensive of the old plakas i got the past few months, it was worth it.  except for a few scratches the guy selling it says it’s still playable. ive been trying to get a good deal for the jcs soundtrack and now i got it! it included pages of photographs and a lyric insert. pretty exciting!  now i just have to get a turntable hehehe

west side story ostfew months back i got west side story also in marikina shoe expo for p75.  before that i was ecstatic to find zefirelli’s romeo and juliet lp and got it for p25 at evangelista in makati.  good thing i already got the cd of the thing and dont have to wait for the turntable to listen to it.

romeo and juliet ost ive been buying lps to build a small collection of favorite albums. other lps already stocked up at home include alvin and the chipmunks christmas album, the rescuers (salvaged from my childhood), the grease soundtrack (typical) and all that jazz. im still hoping to get plakas evoking nostalgia, things that include englebert humperdink and the theme from mahogany (surreal trip). 2nd hand laserdiscs are sold at p50 a piece at evangelista but i couldnt find any of my favorite movies to keep. cheers!

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movies, musings

in the meantime

im back in manela since july 8 scrounging for scraps to feed myself.  currently working on a costume design project with carlo for the university of makati’s version of the siditious play, kahapon ngayon at bukas.  also working out some design stuff with smart.  and presently hoping and negotiating on working with top pinoy director on his latest horror film.  details later para dili maudlot hahaha

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movies

kasal kasali kasalo

30 minutes into the movie and i wanted out. hahaha i expected much from this underdog blockbuster (what?). but after hearing nothing but cat fights and derogatory remarks from characters and nobody to root for or pin my hopes on, i began to hate most of the characters including the two leads. it was like, why would one scene este, night of looking lovingly into each other’s eyes and one piece of dialogue indicating it’s been 4 months since they would then decide to get married? i hoped there would be moments still that there would be any justification that judy ann and ryan were in love but waiting the next 30minutes for that and still no moment taxed on my patience. i know myself to be a patient man but this takes the cake. and to think i dragged my friend who wanted to watch blood diamond instead. i ended up paying his way into the DiCaprio starrer just to wash off KKK’s bickering past.

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movies

casino royale

casino royalejames bond is HOT HOT HOT! when once upon a long time ago ursula andres emerged from the water in her bikini and became pinupgirl all-woman icon embodying feminity and ubber sexiness, now it’s daniel craig’s james bond coming out of the water in his trunks and breaking all molds of crazy sexy all-male icon chervanes that brought even straight men drooling and breaking into sweat hahaha

what is it with bond and getting wet? throughout the film he was drenched in sweat, in other parts he was taking a bath or coming out of the sea. haha

the movie was super fun, still bond with a few departures from the formula, which made it more fun. the film made light of bond’s humanity, much like what scorsese and lloyd-webber did to last temptation of christ and jesus christ superstar respectively. astig !

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