Surprisingly, arrestingly entertaining

Depending on your whim, there are varied ways to experience Till There Was You, the latest romance-comedy movie of Piolo Pascual and Judy Ann Santos.

The film’s publicists had spun it as "a virtual valentine in summer" movie aimed at seducing theater-goers to fall in love again in the time of wars and SARS.

Others might interpret the grand narrative of the film as a reiteration of themes that in life, there are no sheer mishaps, no mere coincidences, and that everything happens for a reason.

On a personal note, I watched the movie twice in succession in one evening with the elementary objectives of simply feeling good after a day’s stressful work, and to reminisce the long Chinese lunches and the even-longer French and Italian dinners with a Japanese friend at Tokyo’s and New York’s toniest restaurants. This Japanese journalist, who now covers the Bush’s White House, and I were fond of this particular song popularized by The Beatles. Somehow, the lyrics of the song sounded more sexy in Nihongo.

I am no follower of Piolo or Judy Ann, but this movie is worth your P60 or P90, depending on your pleasure. That was a long way of saying, I felt de-toxified after watching Till..., easily one of the better local films currently showing.

For the die-hard Judy Ann-Piolo followers, Till... was the movie that they had yearned for: their teaming up again, their very torrid kissing scenes lasting for "three days," and their so artful yet clinically clean bed scenes. If we could immortalize these bed scenes in oil paintings, they may be worthy of display in a gallery, and still escape the censure of the Movie Television Review and Classification Board.

From the moment the duo’s faces appeared on the screen, the shrieks and gasps of their avid fans were so loud, causing mass distraction to the legions who wanted to watch the movie in polite silence.

The screenplay by Dindo Perez and Mel del Rosario suggests hues of Pretty Woman (rich guy trying to discover himself meets adventurous poor girl) which featured the eternally gorgeous Richard Gere and the ever-delectable Julia Roberts. However, the reprise had a twist in the presence of a third key character Pippa (Eliza Pineda), a child born when Albert (Piolo) was still disposed to having one-night stands. (But didn’t he realize that he could have used a condom?)

As Albert, a young unwed father but a fast-rising lawyer, grappled with the idea of breaking the truth to Pippa about her perpetually absent mother, Joanne (Judy Ann) intruded in his life again on the 6th birthday of his daughter. Member-of-the-genteel-class Albert and perennial job-hopper Joanne had crossed paths years before inside a bus where she established instant rapport with a very young Pippa. As she disembarked from the bus, Joanne had accidentally left a book where one of her graduation photos was inserted. The photo was used by Albert to create the character of a globe-trotting mama for Pippa.

The concept of an unwed father in search of a wife was refreshing. It has not been used recently. Was it a subtle commentary on the plight of thousands of Filipino children whose mothers have to work overseas?

For a fee of P60,000, Joanne agreed to a proposal by Albert to play mother to Pippa for 30 days. It was during these roller-coaster 30 days that the pithy part of the movie revolved.

We witnessed tensions in the fragmentation of belief and practice, the pains of renunciation, and the joys of reconciliation.

Beyond the love story of Albert and Joanne, more than the plot of Pippa’s longing for and finding a surrogate mother, Till... was a complex and multi-tiered narrative of a tortured father-and-son relationship; of a young man’s labyrinthine journey toward maturity, his angst, denials, and refusal to take responsibility for his life, the difficulties in saying the dreaded declaration I Love You; the very familiar Peter Pan syndrome caused by the bitter separation of his father and mother; and the proverbial poverty of the spirit amid the wealth of material resources.

As for Joanne, she likewise discovered herself in the process of playing mother to Pippa. That she would rather be in this crazy country to be with Albert and Pippa instead of moving to New Zealand to be with cows. Judy Ann was convincing enough in essaying the role of a carefree character who eventually mellowed within 30 days.

The screenplay by Perez and Del Rosario playfully presented the issue of social stratification through the scenes where Joanne’s father nonchalantly took a leak against a concrete wall while the family was entertaining Albert and Pippa in their yard, and when Joanne was shown cooking turon instead of baking a cake or whipping up a pasta dish to forget her troubles. These were classy acts to manifest the Marxist idea of class difference.

Piolo, in this film, had shown his own brand of an insecure, vulnerable, but winning character. He persuasively embodied the despair of a lot of young professionals who bury themselves in work, hoping that personal problems would simply go away even if not confronted squarely.

Studiously watch him grimace and twist his torso to convey utter confusion, pain, and surrender in the scene after Joanne leaves him furiously because he could not define honestly his feelings toward her. Instead of telling her I love you, Albert asked Joanne: Am I being unfair? I don’t know what to do. Am I unfair for asking you to play the role of her mother? Albert unsuccessfully used Pippa’s demand for a mother to cloak his need for Joanne, prompting Joanne to hastily flee from the room.

Back to the scene of a grimacing Albert who did not utter any word, it was riveting. This scene was one of the film’s gifts to the theater-goers. A small, memorable wonder. Piolo is not yet a Christopher de Leon. But he showed potentials in this film.

Piolo should consider strongly shifting away from roles that capitalize solely on his youth and beauty. Maybe now is the perfect time for him to graduate to more mature roles. His presence had razzle-dazzled the lethargic local entertainment industry like no other. There is no question about this, whatever reservations one may have about him.

Of late, the local entertainment industry has not produced any worthy successor to the legendary Eddie Garcia, Christopher, or Phillip Salvador. Piolo can be an indestructible contender to become a successor to these highly respected actors, given proper movie projects and provided that Piolo himself would have the courage to prepare for this back-breaking and perilous journey. He must ready himself for the journey’s toll and its demand for exacting, unwavering professionalism. No room for excuses. Period.

For this young actor, it may be a frightening prospect to even think of being compared with Eddie, Christopher, or Philip this early in his career. He has no other recourse but send a message to all skeptics that he would like to embark on this mission. He has to tell them that he would go out of his way to accomplish this unenviable task. It is a heavy burden, but he must not shirk from it for few are exceptionally qualified and uniquely positioned to follow in their footsteps. He may want to consider a genuine professional training in acting or drama to prepare himself fully.

Director Joyce Bernal’s techniques were commendable. She had managed to navigate the ramifications of the sub-plots without losing focus and control of her aim to shoot a film featuring a Piolo-Judy Ann tandem almost in the threshold of maturity, and yet ably insisted that they were still teeny-boppers.

However, there were several scenes which should have been shortened because they slackened the pace of the film. Notable among these were the ones showing Albert and Joanne making it out or the close-up shots of Piolo. Never mind that his close-up shots had this poster effect if frozen.

Star Cinema sources explained that Bernal had deliberately prolonged a number of scenes because of what the director termed as "kilig rhythm" of the movie-goers. Still, the film dragged at some points.

The photography and lighting by Charlie Peralta brought more vibrance to the film, but sad to say the music scoring by Raul Mitra was uneven and feeble. One did not come out of the theater humming Mitra’s score of Till There Was You. One could barely remember if there was an effort on his part to even try to have bars of this timeless song rendered by different instruments, say a haunting flute or a sorrowful guitar to add more spice to a scene. One was left waiting to hear a bar or two using fresh approaches. It was a futile exercise.

Despite the film’s flaws, Till There Was You generally warmed the hearts of theater-goers. It was surprisingly and arrestingly entertaining.