More than just telling a story or highlighting the filmmaker's artistry, a film should be able to connect with its audience. After a long time, unexpectedly, I was again moved to tears in my last trip to the movie house. I saw the restored version of the Carlitos Siguion- Reyna film, "Ang Lalake Sa Buhay Ni Selya" at the UP Cine Adarna.
When this movie was released -- year 1997--- I was just a kid. So this was my first time watching it. Having little appreciation for cinema that time, I'm sure I'd just brush this movie off as a "sexy film."
Taken from the perspective of Rafa Siguion-Reyna, son of Carlitos, who was at the theatre, he confessed that during that time, when he just around 7 years old, his friends were teasing him because his father was making "bomba films." The young Rafa would defend his dad saying, "Hindi bomba film yan! Yan ay freedom of expression!" See? It's not easy to be a filmmaker's progeny.
Fast forward 2015, having taken up film appreciation classes and having seen a variety of movies, plus the fact that I've kinda grown up (gasps!) and witnessed (and perpetually trying to understand) the dynamics of human relationships, this film, to me now, is more than just showing off flesh and sex scenes. But yes, it does have a lot of "daring" scenes.
At the movie's centre is a simple story that revolves around four central characters, whose need to be accepted, understood and loved is laid out to us right from the beginning. And in the words of the late Princess Diana, it would be difficult if there's "three of us in a marriage." Much so four. In today's Facebook parlance, "it's complicated."
There's a schoolteacher named Selya (Rosanna Roces) whose unrequited 'love' with Bobby (Gardo Versoza), who eventually leaves her, has forced her to run away. She ends up in a town where she meets Piling (Eva Darren), also a schoolteacher, and Ramon (Ricky Davao), a closeted gay man who happens to be a school principal, and is in love with Carding (Allan Paule). Selya and Ramon marries, but she eventually finds out the latter's sexual orientation and true relationship with Carding. Years later, Bobby returns to prove his 'love' for her. With all these happening, they become the talk of the town.
Selya is the lovelorn, whose unrequited love has reduced her to desperation: running away to an unknown place, heeding the advice of a suspicious woman and marrying someone she barely knows. Bobby is the self-centred man, whose primary goal is to meet the needs of the flesh and whose mission is to validate his manhood through his conquests.
Both Ramon and Carding exhibit the idea of a man whose Catholic guilt and moral standards are preventing him from publicly proclaiming an "abnormal" love. Piling is the epitome of the pakialamerang kapamilya, whom we Pinoys are very familiar of. She's our overly-concerned family member or relative who'd like to take over our lives the moment she thinks we need help. Sort of The Messiah complex.
Writer Bibeth Orteza, wife of Carlitos, penned the screenplay and we can all agree that there's richness to it. Sometimes, we see films and we're told with stories that stand just the way they are. And there are others, like Selya, that's not just a fictitious tale but one that mirrors the society we live in. We see the story unfold but we don't just stop there; we also figure out the metamessages. Also, we see a part of ourselves or someone we know in these characters. And that's why we can all relate to it.
Granted that I find the acting quite hammy, it's all right. The story touches me in great depths, especially on its theme of love, self-worth, acceptance and respect. Anybody who'd like to know Love and its different faces should at least take time to watch this.
