Maryo J: A magnifico kind of director

Success is a two-edged sword. Ask director Maryo J. delos Reyes, who has added another feather to his cap when he bagged Best Director honors for Magnifico at the Gawad Urian awards rites last Saturday night.

While his most recent award has placed him on Cloud 9 for the nth time, ("I feel so blessed and inspired to do more movies because of God who helps me"), Direk Maryo admits having mixed feelings about it.

Like most people on top of the heap, the director is paying a stiff price for being way up there.

"People expect you to outdo Magnifico," he says, eyes all puffed-up from an all-night shooting . "But you see, it’s not everyday that I come across a material like Magnifico. I stumbled upon it for the first time after 30 years in the business."

Now, many people are banking on him to uplift the industry, not only locally, but internationally as well. And, while Direk Maryo would willingly shoulder this responsibility, he will be the first to say Magnifico did more than turn his career around. It overhauled his entire life.

"It’s a spiritual journey," he describes his powerful film. "This movie about hope transformed me. It also made me more mature in my approach to my career. This time, I won’t be directing as many films as before. I will be more selective in what I do. I won’t, for instance, repeat myself in my films."

Surely, he’s not repeating himself in Kulimlim, Viva Films’ entry to the Manila Filmfest. The story about demonic possession is a first for this director known for youth-oriented films like Bagets a few decades back.

Therein lies the challenge.

"This is one material I can sink my teeth into," he proudly says. "Kulimlim depicts demonic possession in a scary way. It’s about the justice system and how far a man can go in entertaining evil in his life."

The other challenge is to squeeze the acting juice out of Robin Padilla, who is more known as an action star than anything else. Thank goodness Direk Maryo, like Lino Brocka and Joel Lamangan, is a product of PETA. Because of this, he (direk Maryo) did not only instruct his actors, he himself acted out the scene for them before each take.

Before Robin (and leading lady Tanya Garcia) shot a running or climbing scene, the director had already shown them how he’d like them done. Before Tanya shot her rape scene, direk Maryo demonstrated the angle, the horrified look, the terror of it all in the hands of the hoodlums.

It drove the fiftysomething director to exhaustion and even to near-collapse, but everybody swears the effort was worth it.

Now some sectors are predicting an acting award for Robin, and Tanya is said to have greatly improved on her acting.

"Direk was able to bring out whatever was hidden in Mr. Robin and me," Tanya admits.

Robin, who turned down the offer to play the lead role at first but relented after learning that direk Maryo was on top of the project, agrees.

"Direk Maryo didn’t beat around the bush. He was direct with his instructions," Robin says of his first working experience with the award-winning director.

The result, direk Maryo promises, is a different Robin, totally removed from the usual bang-bang, kiss-kiss characters he’d play on screen.

The trick, he reveals, is plain and simple human relations. Treat your actors the way you’d like them to treat you.

"Show them you love them, that you want to help them, not only with their career, but in their personal growth," reveals direk Maryo. "After all,:" he adds, "you’re both artists. You speak the same language. You’re working toward the same goal"

Sometimes, you have to demonstrate the scene for them. At other times, you have to shock. Still, all the others need is just an attitude, a frame of mind, and they’ll take it from there.

Another set of artists he encountered while doing the movie was the group of young musicians playing under the famous Bolipata Brothers. Direk Maryo refused to settle for anything less than live sound. So he and the crew found a place in Zambales where the Bolipata Brothers’ young trainees happened to be practicing for a violin recital.

"It was a give-and-take relationship. When the cameras would start to roll, the young musicians stopped playing. The sound of passing vehicles, of people talking — everything — had to stop," recalls the director.

But, when it was time for the violinists to practice, the cast and crew gladly gave way.

The director explains his preference for live sound: "I discovered that the international (film) market goes for live sound. Now, 80 percent of Kulimlim was done on live sound."

And while he has high hopes about the Robin Padilla starrer, direk Maryo is mum as to whether it will equal or surpass his other film, Naglalayag, in terms of honors come awards night.

"I’m sure people will pit my work against each other. But I’m not competing with anyone but myself," he declares.

It’s enough that direk Maryo "leaves a part of myself in every film I do."

And, in doing so, he is giving his audience, not just another movie, but a whole new experience that touches their lives long after the closing credits have faded away.