Mulat (2014)

Just when I thought the last few days of 2014 will be boring and spent cleaning our room, I received an invitation one night to watch the New Wave segment of the Metro Manila Film Festival. I'm not sure if I had heard of MMFF New Wave before, but if ever I did, I must have just ignored it since I'm not at all interested in the crappy movies in the MMFF.

But when a trip organizer I met last July said that he's got tickets to his brother's short film which is competing in the New Wave and is inviting me to watch, I did a quick research and immediately said yes. Part of me wanted to just see him again since I was awed at how comfortable I was with him that first time we met. The film buff in me, on the other hand, saw this as another opportunity to get to know new non-mainstream films. Based on experience, non-mainstream has never disappointed me and they certainly outdo the much clichéd, ultra shallow mainstream ones. 

We were supposed to watch at Glorietta 4 but ended but in SM Megamall. His bro's film will be shown a little later and so we ended up buying tickets to Maria Diane Ventura's Mulat, his treat. We had more than an hour before showtime so we hang out at El Pollo Loco for some tortilla with chicken while talking about travel plans and our recent travels. I kept on prodding him to teach me how to bike because this poor girl loves to travel but is unfortunately not equipped with a lot of practical skills and only bank on courage alone for adventures

We watched two shorts--- An Maugmang Lugar is about a dead man who couldn't seem to move on because of unfinished business with his wife/ lover. It is a short animated film with no dialogues. I don't know if this is just me but it reminds me of a scene in Final Fantasy X where Yuna, wanting to hug Tidus, only ended up running through him as he fades away. The other, Bimyana, as about an Aeta girl who was chosen to be her school's representative except her mother doesn't support the idea. I didn't know the outcome of the story because sadly I fell asleep. (I'm just so tired these days....)

Then Mulat. I was instantly uneasy with the first scene as Vincent (Ryan Eigenman) and Sam (Loren Burgos) fought over a petty thing while in the car. I was just afraid this was some romantic film. Yes it is about love, but so unlike the romantic flicks. It explores what makes up a toxic relationship as portrayed in a scene where Sam debates with her sister's fiancé about settling down vs. a male's dislike towards pressure to marry. Naturally, I took note of that, which may just come in handy should I enter a relationship in the [hopefully] near future.

The two met a car accident when their car slammed on a moving motorcycle. Then came the flashbacks. And some sort of Inception-like events ensued with Sam meeting a guy named Jake (Jake Cuenca). Suddenly the roles are reversed with Sam not wanting to commit after her traumatizing breakup with Vincent whereas Jake persuades her to give him a chance. He helps her find a psychiatrist who used hypnosis as cure for Sam to gain peace. 

The ensuing events show the film's twist which follows Christopher Nolan's dream/ reality dichotomy. It turns out that Sam was actually in a comatose state following the car accident whereas Jake, revealed to be the mototcycle rider,  was also in another room in the same hospital. Sam in the dream world tells Jake to find her and Jake wakes up in a frenzied state to search for Sam.

The twist simply awed me. I never would have thought that a local director would be able to pull off something brilliant like that with a small budget. In the end, it all depends on how creative a narrative can be and how one can adapt it to film to make a powerful and memorable movie.

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I don't know why I always end up watching pieces with intelligent takes on love. Earlier this month, I watched the musical play Prinsipe Munti in CCP. It's based on Antoine de Saint-Exupéry simple yet profound book The Little Prince. While it provides a thesis on what the most important thing is in the world, the play also conjectures on what it means to love and to be loved. I cried all throughout the play.

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I don't know what came over him to ask me suddenly to watch a movie but I am glad he did. How often do people want to meet up with people whom you meet only once on a trip? I am that kind of person, and it pleases me to see that despite the fact that both of us have hectic schedules and our own trips which almost always coincide so we never get to travel again, we still make it a point to keep our communication lines open and update each other on our future plans. I also love it that before the day was over during our falls trek, he said that it seemed like he has known me for so long. I felt the same way, too.