A different way of loving thy neighbor

If I didn’t know that Ellen Ongkeko-Marfil has had her share of award-winning works (including her documentary drama on Filipino desaparecidos, Walang Bakas, which she did for GMA Network and won for her the Best Drama program category in the Catholic Mass Media Awards in 2004 and also got her in the list of finalists for the Asian TV Awards, as well as her earlier documentary, Luha, Pawis at Tuwa: Kasaysayan ng mga Babaeng Maralita, which got for her the Gawad CCP award), I would nominate her for the "Girl Wonder of Philippine Movies" Award. But as everyone knows, Ellen has always delivered more than sufficiently in the few works that she has so far done.

And one shouldn’t wonder at all that her most recent work, Pusang Gala, confirms not just her intimate knowledge of the craft of movie directing, but her great passion for what she has just accomplished. Indeed, this was one material that the director could claim she truly loved. That, of course, has made the big difference between Pusang Gala and those movies that their directors did not care about at all.

It helps a lot that Ellen, as producer and director, chose an adaptation from the Palanca first prize-winning play, Mga Estranghero at Gabi, by Jun Lana. The screenplay, in turn, is a collaboration between June and Rody Vera who, too, has won in various national literary competitions.

Ellen’s brilliance and wisdom are even more evident in her choice of the cast. To be sure, these are veterans as well as new but promising faces to be reckoned with.

Irma Adlawan is a veteran stage actress, who has covered all kinds of roles, her portrayal of which I have personally watched and admired. Her "make-over" or new image fits Marta to a T that’s the way a lot of ad agency girls look like these days.

Marta, the advertising agency executive, is smart in the office, but well, is stupid where her love life is concerned. To her credit, Irma on stage is true to her character as much as Irma of the wide screen. It’s an oft-repeated compliment these days, but there is no doubt that in Pusang Gala, she personally seals her fate as the original Queen of Digital Movies.

The ritual that she goes through, while waiting for her "now-she-sees-him, now-she doesn’t" love, Steve, played by Reggie Curley, is an almost too familiar scene, something that we have seen in our friends, family members and, alas, even in our very selves. A woman bathes in scent meant to make her man want to devour her, beautifies herself from head to toe, transforms her living room into a set meant for a Valentine’s movie, and she ends up waiting and waiting. How sad! But how real! And Reggie acts out Steve in a manner that reminds us of male friends who are sweet and relaxed and truly pleasant to be with, but at the same time, distant and detached, uncaring even.

Ricky Davao, for his part, gives us, not surprisingly, an equally convincing portrayal of Boyet, the gay writer who writes romantic Tagalog novels. Again, it is a given that Boyet knows the twists and turns of a love affair enough to please his readers, but how he would manipulate or "write" his own love life to his satisfaction is something that he has yet to learn. So, he ends up loving an occasional lover, Dom (played by Lauren Novero) who does not act but actually "lives" his role. Again, it is to Ellen’s credit that she chose this young man, who is relatively new in show business, but who obviously has the sensitivity and intelligence required of any actor whom we would love to describe as "most likely to succeed."

Jojo, successfully essayed by Alchris Galura, is the teenaged amateurish criminal on the street whom Boyet adopts. When Dom, the lover, starts living with the gay father and adopted son, conflict ensues and the movie unfolds like it does in such typical situations, but with a most tragic ending. It’s amazing how this young actor, Alchris, could display such sensitivity to a role that is so very different from his real-life "sheltered boy next door" self.

The nice thing about this movie is, for all its being familiar, it remains fresh even as it renews our innermost urgings to wonder why the world that we live in is what it is.

As I watch the movie unfold, I cannot help feeling like a real neighbor to Boyet and Marta who live next to each other in a row of houses. I am the unseen third member of the original community where only Boyet and Marta exist, waiting for their lovers, and hoping for their love lives to turn for the better. A peeping Tom, an eavesdropper, an invisible intruder, the omnipresent once, call me as you please, but that’s how I feel as a member of audience. Being right there, knowing about my neighbors’ lives, but not being able to do something about them, simply because I cannot, even if Ellen makes me want to reach out to them.

On a different level, as I watch Marta’s masochistic attitude towards her "lulubog-lilitaw" Steve, and Boyet’s equally going-ga-ga over Dom, I also cannot help being reminded of a gay friend who once called me up at two o’clock in the morning crying because he had just been manhandled by his lover, a rock band member. Much as I was worried for him, I could not do anything at that unholy hour. But as soon as I woke up six in the morning, I called up a common friend and told him to go to our friend who probably needed to see a doctor. Half an hour later, our common friend called me up, crying out invectives, and reporting that our manhandled friend, as told to him by the maid, left early in the morning with his lover to take their breakfast at the nearby Aristocrat. The maid told him too that from the restaurant, they were going shopping at Cartimar because there were "new arrivals." Knowing my friend, they would end up shopping till they dropped dead, just to make his boyfriend happy, and everything that transpired the night before, all buried and forgotten. Goodness gracious, so, what else is new?

Pusang Gala may be a funny movie where it is meant to be funny. But it is definitely a movie that makes us think. At the end, it makes us wonder what would happen to this friendship between Boyet and Marta. Does this mean a beginning of something that we never imagined could happen as we watched all along? One wonders further how friendships and relationships such as those between Marta and Boyet, as they evolve through time, could become successful as in a fairy tale where everyone lives happily ever after.

Ellen is a great director for making us want to explore the possibilities that could be had from our own relationships as we live life, right here and outside of the movie house. She wakes us up from the lethargy of acceptance of our lot as she challenges us to get out of the box, so to speak. You see a typical sharing of time, joys and frustrations between two neighbors. You see them living parallel lives, each searching for his or her happiness. And yet, Ellen wants us to see more. Is it possible that more could be had from this very typical friendship? I dare not answer. Not for now, at least.

As I end, I take my hats off to Ellen because she has indeed gotten out of the box. For one born with a silver spoon in her mouth, Ellen surprises us for the breadth of her knowledge of life outside the confines of the enclaves of the rich with which she is very familiar, no doubt.

Pusang Gala, I must insist, is a most fitting tribute to Ellen’s late father, Erasto, after whom the outfit that produced this movie was named.

To Marilou, Laurice, Olivia and the few others who belong to their select company, I have but one message: Please welcome dear Ellen!