Two Funerals keeps local cinema alive

The fact that Two Funerals, a movie with a very timely theme, is opening tomorrow, Sept. 8, tempts me to make the following three guesses:

1) That is the only opening playdate available.

2) Its director, Gil Portes, is a psychic and foresaw these current events happening around this period and made a film about it.

3) The scenes depicted in the movie happen all the time in this Third World country and any time is a good time to exhibit a film like this one.

Written by Enrique Ramos, the story of Two Funerals begins with a bus accident that claimed the lives of several people and one of them is Pinoy Big Brother alumna Princess Manzon, the girlfriend of Xian Lim and the daughter of Tessie Tomas. As you must have noticed, buses are currently very much in the news. These vehicles either plunge into ravines (there’s practically one bus accident every week lately) or used for hostage taking.

Middle of last week, when the remains of the foreigners who died in the hostage drama were brought back to their Hong Kong homeland, there was mix-up of bodies. The switching of two coffins is the foundation of the story of Two Funerals. The bungling funeral parlor staff sends the body of Princess to Sorsogon — in Matnog, the farthest end of this Bicol province. To Tessie’s horror and outrage, the coffin delivered to their house up north contains the corpse of a man, whose remains should have been the one shipped to Matnog, where this now dead person had a price on his head, being the town’s most wanted.

Since nobody wanted to have anything to do with this deceased criminal — in life and even in death — what to do with his remains becomes a problem. Younger brother Benjie Felipe had long disowned him. The only time this older sibling becomes useful to him is when he holds a wake for the deceased at his home — displaying the unopened casket of poor Princess — and makes money by setting up gambling tables. Benjie also makes a cool P10,000 from the barangay captain whose ultimate pleasure is to see this wanted man dead as a way of exacting vengeance (a crime is committed that stains the honor and reputation of the official’s family).

Tessie, the loving mother, however, is indignant. She vows to get her daughter’s remains wherever it is. And so she sets off with the boyfriend of Princess and together they drive to Sorsogon, with the funeral car bearing the criminal’s body trailing them.

Two Funerals at this point becomes a road movie and we see not just sights of Luzon island, but also witness age-old traditions of Lent since the story happens during Holy Week when the Catholic Church holds its most colorful rituals: The parade of flagellants (not necessarily recognized officially by the church though), the Good Friday processions and the salubong of Easter Sunday.

Along the way, there is also this panoply of little stories that displays human frailties of people they meet during the trip and a most interesting twist is discovering that Princess, whose death is mourned by her mother and her boyfriend, also had her weak moments in life.

Passing through several towns and provinces, we also see this nation’s rotting system from bad service (service in this country really sucks), dirty politics to police corruption. To think that they only covered one major island and didn’t really comb each place thoroughly.

It is to the credit of the writer and director — who are both very creative — that we see a realistic depiction of the Philippines as the Sick Man of Asia. Even the performances of the cast members contribute greatly to the artistic success of Two Funerals: Tessie Tomas (her portrayal of her character is very tempered and this clearly shows what a disciplined actress she is), newcomer Xian Lim, Benjie Felipe and Mon Confiado (the brains behind the money-making wake) who both succeed at giving the film its light moments with their great comedic timing and Althea Vega as Benjie’s sensible wife.

Graded A by the Cinema Evaluation Board (CEB), Two Funerals truly has a lot of merits as a film (great cinematography being one of them). It also opened my eyes to how President Benigno Aquino III’s pronouncements on how he is eradicating corruption in this country is already sinking into the consciousness of the public, including this jaded writer’s mind. Great work by his publicity machinery! I hope he succeeds with his attempt to improve the situation of the Philippines and I pray that what he says is not just propaganda. You see, while watching Two Funerals, I was surprised to witness kotong cops still plying their trade in the film, having forgotten that this movie was shot in March — some two months before the elections.

Since I try to be law-abiding and has yet to be apprehended for a traffic violation, I have no idea if we still have mulcting cops within our midst — what with P-Noy’s promise to get rid of them. Maybe there still are. But hopefully they’re no longer around.

Lately, we’ve set aside the image of the police as corrupt. They’re now branded as bumpkins, no thanks to that messed-up hostage drama.

But I’m hoping that whatever society Gil Portes depicts in this movie will soon find a cure. If not, he should come up with a sequel to Two Funerals and that should make all of us weep as we mourn for the death of this nation.

At the moment, I am only taking comfort in the fact that with a great indie movie like Two Funerals, we can see that local cinema is still alive.