Respeto: New verse and old pages
ALBERTO Monteras II’s debut full-length film Respeto, acclaimed for its cinematic artistry, deserved the highest form of regard for outstripping the recurrent pit that most films fall into—lack of sophistication in depicting the realest stature of human life.
Respeto is rich in character and in color, as it is the first film brave enough to go beyond the life buried in poverty while highlighting sociopolitical undertones.
Monteras’ craft is a heavy needle dropping on a rusty vinyl record of vivid yesterdays, its poetry disarmingly written in coruscating verse with a human face--giving a hard look on bitter Philippine realities. The story centers on a poet who lost his son and wife, a family trying to fight for their home, a boy drifting in the tides of poverty, a strong friendship and escape in music.
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Monteras is a beast in 24 frames per second for bringing home Best Film, and so is his editor Lawrence Ang for Best Editing. Each moment either breathes placidly into slow and contemplative silence and melancholy, or drops the sickest beat in fast-paced cutting, leaving its breathless audience in pulsating excitement. The frames of Respeto linger long enough to hammer its virtue to the audience without being preachy, and perhaps some linger quickly enough to maintain the film’s life and for the audience to crave for more.
Ike Avellana, Respeto’s cinematographer, also bagged Best in Cinematographer for his beautiful illumination of the dark underground rap scene, for the intimate exploration of the shadowy corners of Pandacan and for the very promising movement of the camera that in itself communicates a deeper meaning of the scenes.
The limitation of one’s dignity in exchange for respect is one of the concerns of Monteras. How often does a person need to blur the line reason to be respected by his society? How much respect must he give? And how far from his luckless present circumstances does respect as a currency take an individual?
Hendrix (played remarkably by Raymund Abracosa despite having no acting background) is portrayed as someone full of confidence and with tremendous excitement for life. He one day dreams of being lined equally with his idol Breezy G, but he struggles to cross the steep tightrope towards royalty. His personality is variedly explored depending on the people he is with.
When Hendrix is around Betchai and Payaso, (played by Chai Fonacier and Yves Bagadion, respectively, both excellent) he acts comfortably and with joyous display of self-perceived skill, given that Betchai and Payaso both lighten and color Hendrix’ life and the film’s should-have-been dry moments (like fixing a wrecked bookstore) with humorous conversation (and awesome beatboxing!). Betchai and Payaso gives Hendrix something to hold onto when everything around him—his family, his reputation, his self-respect falls bitterly unto him—friendship.
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Hendrix’ sister Connie (Thea Yrastorza) and her drug-dealing boyfriend Mando (Brian Arda,) however, suppresses the life inside Hendrix. Shown constantly maltreated by the people who live with him under the same roof, Hendrix could not consider their small structure of concrete and wood a home. This tough-love attitude by the two however, is very easily misunderstood as cruelty, but one cannot blame the poor couple for acting belligerent towards Hendrix; they are the unkind product of their likewise unkind society, with money as their very earnest expression of family.
The third person that greatly reveals an atypical persona of Hendrix is Doc (Dido De La Paz). Doc is a veteran poet and a martial law victim who owns a secondhand bookstore in Pandacan, and serves as a father figure of Hendrix. He is haunted by the painful memory of his past, through visions of his bloodied son and suffering wife, who are also victims of a pitiless dictatorship. Doc is able to show the most emotional and vulnerable alleyways of Hendrix. Similarly, Hendrix was able to make Doc realize how much he has let himself suffer by isolating himself from people and from sulking inside the four walls of his home.
The film creates a chemistry between a teenager rapper and an elderly poet, showing that in the end, both are prisoners of their dark circumstance, one of poverty, and one of his past.
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Hendrix is first seen as just another shadow in a crowd, someone hardly belonging in a group that does not recognize him. But during the times he decides to step up and prove himself a veteran on the craft, he stumbles hopelessly when his attempt to gain respect turns against him, leaving him in humiliation and utter belittlement.
The intertwining of characters blend so effortlessly, crossing from the antagonistic, though significantly drawing idol-rival of Hendrix (Marlon Peroramas, popularly known as Loonie) to his bar girl love interest, Candy (Kate Alejandrino). Doc even has a police-son who is obscurely involved with Mando, where the film hints a mutualism between the police and the criminal.
But there is much more to “Respeto” than its characters might suggest. Monteras shatters the idea that there is nothing more inside a political film than its convictions seeping loudly to its audience in every turn. It is subtle in its discourse, and says by unsaying; it shows its thorns as creatively as cinema allows.
As the film is full of interesting characters, it also tackles significant discussions of societal issues which, depending on one’s stand, might either gratify or enrage. An example would be the reference in the movie through the lines in the rap battles, the trio’s conversations and scenes that display a dead civilian wearing a cardboard issue that mirror the current administration’s war on drugs (or the infamous Oplan Tokhang).
However, the most striking topic that the film courageously confronted was the discussion of Martial Law and accordingly, the burying of a dictator in the Libingan ng mga Bayani. “The day I move on is the day I give up.” A female voice, probably a commentaries person on the radio said. And that really puts things into perspective because with enough knowledge of what people are expected to move on easily from without receiving justice, how can they? How can Doc? How can the Filipino? And so Doc vividly narrates to Hendrix how the Philippine gendarmerie violated him and his family. “Wala akong nagawa.” Doc uttered. Watching Doc break to sorrowful remembrance while he shares his story was agonizing.
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Respeto is radical and revelatory; it is elucidating while it is dark, and profound as it is heavy. But despite the film’s tendency to dwell on its multiple political suggestions, Respeto does not bore, and the wistful culprit of its attention-thieving nature is how it gracefully unifies the traditional form of argumentative exchange, balagtasan, and the more modern and pop-culture rap battling in the setting of Bersos. The imagery of the lines beautifully written by Bienvenido Lumbera, Vim Nadera and other veteran writers tells a vivid narrative of social realities that makes the film more alarmingly personal and describes a place and a time that’s not all far in the past or far in the future—it describes life in the painful present.
Respeto gave the art form a way to express itself larger than where it usually resides in dark, underground venues or in unpopular coffee shops. Does this art form deserve respect? Of course it does. To be able to write rhymes and throw lines that fulfill its message meaningfully through the delivery of the rapper or the poet, to move a crowd and put them in roaring elation, and to reflect in those lines a plight of the masses larger than the self, is too generous a skill, too intricate an art, and too rich a culture to be considered a language of the poor.
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One can easily talk about how beautiful the colors of the film are and how luminous the lines used in the film are. However, that would just tell of a person staring at a brilliant painting and all he could see is how it looks like. But Respeto enlightens and disturbs its audience. It gives a breath of life to its characters, of new verse and of old pages, a story worth listening to. To be able to look through a window of others’ consciousness and to be one with their struggle in life is a gift that only art could give. To see through Respeto’s window is a privilege. JULIUS VILLAVIEJA
