Spotlight on Filipino camp, costume design: 'Ten Little Mistresses' review

*This movie review includes minor spoilers*

MANILA, Philippines — Prime Video has pooled its chips with director Jun Robles Lana for the streaming platform's first-ever Filipino original film "Ten Little Mistresses," dubbed "the mistresses movie to end all mistresses movies."

The titular mistresses are all squabbling to be the one true love of recently widowed Don Valentin Esposo, played by John Arcilla, but when he ends up dead everyone becomes a suspect.

Lana has rallied a sprawling entertaining cast of women to play Valentin's mistresses — Pokwang, Carmi Martin, Agot Isidro, Kris Bernal, Arci Muñoz, Christian Bables, Sharlene San Pedro, Iana Bernardez, Kate Alejandrino, and Adrianna So — each giving unique characterizations that are humorous in their own right.

And caught in the middle of the vultures is Eugene Domingo's Lilith, Valentin's trusted butler, with fellow house help Chiclet played by Donna Cariaga not far away aiding her.

The inspiration of other mystery stories, like classic Agatha Christie novels to the recent "Knives Out" films by Rian Johnson, is very evident in how "Ten Little Mistresses" plays out but what makes it unique is how Lana incorporates Filipino pop culture into his film.

There are too many to mention, examples being "bitch ka lang, ako super bitch" from 2012's "A Secret Affair," a copycat reference (rest in peace Cherie Gil), and the childish term "period no erase, lunok susi" which goes even longer.

Beyond that, Lana also inserts references considered iconic in gay culture, again to just name a few drag queen Sasha Velour's rose petal reveal and the campy cult classic "Temptation Island."

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It is that particular avenue that makes "Ten Little Mistresses" so entertaining, it leans into and accepts how campy it is and it's all the better for it; if anything it even appears to energize the mystery aspect of the film further.

Everyone in the cast is acting on a high calibre that doesn't upstage anyone else, though naturally taking up most of the time are the sleuthing skills of Domingo's Lilith and Cariaga's Chiclet, and Arcilla revelling in the chauvinist and misogynistic identity of his character.

The personal bickerings between Pokwang's Babet and Martin's Magenta or Isidro's Helga and Bernal's Diva, Alejandrino's Sparkle poking at the repetitive interjections of So's Because, the intimate banter between San Pedro's Moon-Young and Bernardez's Coco, the fortune-telling madness of Muñoz's Aura, or the silent smirks of Bables' Lady G, everyone gets an opportunity to shine.

Also becoming a character of its own is the costume design by Jaylo Conanan aided by the hair pieces and wigs by Jaydee Jasa; in at least five key scenes their creative works amplifies the identities of the characters, and takes the film's camp nature to a different level.

As mystery films go, "Ten Little Mistresses" is quite tame — of course the butler is involved somehow, and the twists never stop — yet its the Filipino uniqueness that overshadows the motive and murder.

Lana does struggle to wrap the theme of women empowerment into a bow by the end, sprinkling it here and there during the middle chunk, but the effort is commendable nonetheless.

The thought of the world getting to see Filipino camp this way is a very exciting prospect, they have no idea what's going to hit them, not with a red carpet like this.

"10 Little Mistresses" streams exclusively on Prime Video beginning Feb. 15, 2023.

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