Getting the job done

I’ve been a fanboy of film director Erik Matti since Ekis impressed me with its mise-en-scenes, Albert Martinez’s terrific acing, and of course that highlight that was Sunshine Cruz’s engaging dance into our memory’s very loins through a fanbreeze.

The ending may have been too Breathless-(1 & 2) derivative, but then again, an hommage is made worthy if the one who honors a precedent nearly matches the honoree in stylistic execution.

With On the Job, which I hope stays in theaters for some time to continue to enthrall savvy audiences, Matti establishes himself as unarguably our most exciting and consummate film director.

Everything in the film is of the first water. This is how we compete honorably with the world’s best in cinema, and not just by inundating European film fests with homoerotic indie stuff or Third World urban decay porn to pander to fest judges’ proclivities for a curious kind of gender sensitivity and post-colonial tsk-tsk’s, respectively.   

Arguments may fly as to whether this is another Erik Matti edition of Manila noir. Only partly so, it may be said. But as far as I know, our urban milieu is very much a central character in OTJ — well beyond the graphic density of spaghetti power lines, dark alleys, abattoirs, hovels and jailyards.

The protagonist, a shrewd Goliath in Gotham sneering “Gago!” at all hours, is the culture of corruption that breeds characteristic forms and formats of ingenuity — such as the rites of furlough granted jailbirds to get an assassin’s hit done.

These mercenaries gain a weekend of freedom as well as a paycheck. Symbiotic is their relationship with prison wardens, to start off a chain from the bottom up — leading all the way to the top ranks of the police and military, hooking in a legislator and then some along the way.

“’Pag pumalpak ito, aabot ‘to hanggang Malacañang.” This utterance gives us the bird’s-eye view, while on ground level, our senses feast on and empathize with the oh-so-Pinoy lives that radiate edgewise from the motley fringes.

Here are where the lesser players or the common folk thrive, not so much exulting in their occasional attempts at heroism by way of perseverance, honesty and idealism, but driven just as much by the complexity of their family obligations, their love lifes, patent adultery, parent-child relationships, until they run out of hope.

On the Job is a complex film, with parallel narratives and intertwining threads coursing through the city streets like chaotic traffic. With its powerful story, ambitious scenario, envisioned gravitas and a myriad of characters, it is a difficult film to make. It’s our luck and our pride that Erik Matti succeeds so thoroughly in executing his entire wishlist of facets to gift us with an excellent film.

Story (by Matti), script (by Matti and Michiko Yamamoto), acting, cinematography, editing, music, production design — all check, vigorously.

Joel Torre’s understated performance — chiefly with his eyes and consistently impassive mien — is downright marvelous. Congrats and kudos to this friend of ours for winning the Best Actor award in the Puchon International Film Festival in South Korea.

He’s told us that it was unexpected. He was just proud to represent our country, he said, but that he suddenly felt much like the Smart Gilas basketball team when he was given the award. Ha ha. 

Joel added: “It was a courageous move to gamble on a genre film that was out of circulation in Philippine cinema. We have so much material in Filipino crime stories.” 

Yes, true. Or even other types of narratives. With topnotch storyteller-directors like Erik Matti, there is indeed much hope that the complexity of edgewise lives in a curious dance with the mainstream quotidian, however frequently laced with criminality, will strengthen the memory of our race when it’s presented by way of outstanding films.  

Never mind pretentious parvenu critics who use jargon like bildung and frisson while posturing as intellectual-ish and academic iconoclasts. It’s part of the territory. We don’t even need any hitmen to terminate such terminologists. At best they’re fodder for satire.

We must also praise all the actors and technicians that contributed to this film. Special kudos go to Joey Marquez for an every-Juan-de-la-Cruz kind of rendering of his taxing role as a policeman infinitely bypassed for his common decency. His final scene with a rebellious son turned drug pusher is one of the most powerfully evocative in the film.

Kudos as well to musical director Erwin Romulo for a terrific score, never overbearing, rather subtly enhancing particular turns of action and swathes of poignancy with a judicious use of Pinoy covers and the musical artistry of Caliph and Fred Sandoval.

Thank you for a brilliant film, direk Erik Matti.  

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Hearty, brotherly congrats and kudos to Mikael de Lara Co for his third Palanca First Prize in Poetry (in English for the second time). And to Carlomar Arcangel Daoana for his Second Prize in the same genre, received on Sept. 1 on Palanca Night. And to all the other winners, especially of the Grand Prize for the Novel in English, Jose Elvin Bueno for Subversivo, Inc. — which we hear is quite a romp of a futuristic novel.

We failed to meet Mr. Bueno that evening, a pity. He flew in from New York where he’s based. We’ve also heard of how he put his early ad agency experience in Manila to good use for his humorous speculative fiction.

We were very happy that our lifetime buddy, Dr. Cirilo F. Bautista, was the guest of honor and recipient of the Gawad Dangal ng Lahi on the 63rd year of the Carlos Palanca Memorial Awards for Literature.

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Shout-out! The Manila International Book Fair (MIBF) opens this Wednesday, Sept. 11, at the SMX Convention Center at the SM Mall of Asia Complex, Pasay City. It will last until Sept. 15, from 10 a.m. to 8 p.m. daily.

Now in its 34th year, the MIBF remains our biggest and longest-running book fair, showcasing a varied collection of literature for leisure and academic reading. The MIBF is also the go-to venue for this year’s most awaited book launches and signings, dialogues with readers, contests, and other literary events.

MIBF is organized by Primetrade Asia Inc. in partnership with Asian Catholic Communicators Inc., Book Development Association of the Philippines, Philippine Booksellers Association, Inc., and the Overseas Publishers Representatives Organization of the Philippines. For details, call 896-0661 or 896-0682, or e-mail bookfair@primetradeasia.com.