Screen Log 15: In the Fade; Wonderstruck; Novitiate; Atlanta Season 1; A Fantastic Woman

"In the Fade."

There's a scene in IN THE FADE that stood out for me because of the perfect way it embodied the quiet and rage coursing through the entire film. In the courtroom, a medical examiner began discussing in precise, scientific detail the method that led to the earlier deaths of Diane Kruger's husband and son. For the most part, the camera remained on Kruger's face, and we're left with no choice but to listen along with her, and share her grief--and now her agony--unembellished for all to see. Kruger's extraordinary in this scene, and in the rest of the movie; she won the Cannes Actress award for this film, but never made it past France as far as recognition was concerned. And that, I suppose, is key to understanding this film (though Bilge Ebiri makes a case for another way in his review for the Village Voice). What began as a harrowing emotional unraveling of one woman in the aftermath of tragedy became a slow-burn, terrifically acted procedural, and finally, an unexpected hunt--the prey now turned predator, though you could smell the uncertainty off her from a mile away. I'm not very sure I loved the ending, but I'm also not sure there's another ending that could elevate Kruger's character more. This wasn't just a search for closure; this was taking the story, the world, to another plane, beyond simple discussions of morality.

From the maker of the terrific "Far From Heaven" and "I'm Not There" and "Carol" comes WONDERSTRUCK, a movie so unabashedly sentimental, you can almost pinch it. The film has its merits, chief of all its actresses--the terrific Millicent Simmonds (last seen in "A Quiet Place") and Julianne Moore, both of them in silent parts. But the disease of this film starts early on, when Michelle Williams, as the other young protagonist's mother, remarks, "You live in a museum," and then that protagonist eventually ends up living in--where else?--the American Museum of Natural History. It's hard keeping up with the narrative, mostly because it's so, so jarring, the two timelines not quite jiving so much as elbowing each other. It's all style and little substance, honestly, if we're talking substance of Haynes' caliber. So yes, this is a sore disappointment from a filmmaker I've come to admire.

Maggie Betts' Sundance breakthrough NOVITIATE is grandly entertaining, in the sense that priests and nuns placed in non-stereotypical situations (think "We Have a Pope" or "Sister Act") are allowed to break free from their stern, sanctified shells and therefore imbued with human frailty and, oftentimes, comedy. Melissa Leo being a snarky, bitchin' Mother Superior, rolling her eyes with confessions she finds irrelevant, is a ball to watch. She sells the character so much--the attitude and the crisis that befalls her later on--that she should have been the main character. But then I don't really know what to make of the ending, which makes it out like these girls just wanted to be nuns because it would supposedly make them a cut above the rest of us mere mortals as far as heaven is concerned, which for me is just some cultish, close-minded bull. Maybe that's the point--that there are still people out there cloistered enough in their minds to believe that they are actually spiritually more superior than others by virtue of clothing and daily routine alone. Ugh.

I have not much to say about the first season of ATLANTA other than it is perfect. Sometimes you just crave for an intelligent, conscientiously made 10-episode comedy, and sometimes a show comes along and delivers just that.

One of the things I hate seeing most onscreen is the dramatic pause done wrong, or overdone. In the case of Sebastián Lelio's A FANTASTIC WOMAN, it's the latter. I'm a fan of Lelio's "Gloria," and this new film gives us another compelling (but less compelling, if this makes sense) heroine. A transwoman, in this case, in a time and place and culture where transwomen are viewed as chimera. No shit, one of the characters calls the heroine just that. Still, lots of times I found myself wondering about the backstory. That would have been a more interesting, if not way more compelling, story. How did this homewrecking transwoman meet her adulterous lover, and how did the transphobic ex-wife initially react? There's also a kidnapping that's more silly than scary. And the pauses. So distracting. There's a lot to dissect here, a story burgeoning beneath the one being told, past the motherhood statements occasionally tossed around in the actual film.

Screen Log 14: Avengers: Infinity War; Deadpool 2; Citizen Jake; Stronger; Modern Family Season 9

"Stronger."

Lord in heaven, the hype over AVENGERS: INFINITY WAR. Far. Too. Much. Clearly this was a movie made for the fans, for those who have helped build the billion-dollar Marvel film franchise ruling Hollywood now. I don't remember which critic it was who asked if there's even still any point in reviewing this movie, or in saying something bad about it. And yes, it's not a very good movie. It's spread far too thin, even with its twenty-minutes-shy-of-three-hours running time. It's really just a homecoming of sorts, a celebration of all the other Marvel movies that preceded it. For the record, my favorite among those are "Guardians of the Galaxy" (the first one, not the second one, which was bad), "Thor: Ragnarok," "Black Panther" and "Dr. Strange."

I couldn't remember what the first "Deadpool" movie was about, though I do remember being greatly entertained by it. Maybe that's all I'll ever need to say about it. It's one of those fun-but-forgettable movies. Like a great day at a beach that looks just like any other B-rated beach, with friends who're just so-so company. DEADPOOL 2 is a different creature, I think, though don't quote me on that since, again, I don't have a lot of memories of the first one to compare it with. But lord in heaven, the fourth-wall breaking and self-awareness and meta jokes. Far. Too. Much. It's enjoyable at first, but at some point, you just want to tell the movie to get. A. Grip. There's really a fine line between just right and too much, and the makers of this movie don't know that, apparently. By the climax, you can already feel the movie buckle under the weight of its self-confessed cleverness. It's that weight, actually, that made me realize I had a great time during numerous moments. The X-Force's descent into that unnamed city, for one. Hilarious! And whenever Lucky a.k.a. Domino was onscreen (she's really the breakout star of this film, if ever there was one). Landing on an inflatable panda (or was it a bear)? Check. Everybody else dying while she's still gliding closer to the ground on her parachute, smooth as a comet.

There were only eight of us in the cinema last night for an LFS of Mike de Leon's CITIZEN JAKE. I must confess outright that this was only my second Mike de Leon; the first was the restored version of "Kakabakaba Ka Ba?," which I saw during its Trinoma premiere thanks to the invitation of a friend. So I didn't really have much to size "Citizen Jake" up to as far as body of work was concerned. Nevertheless I thought the movie was--foremost--essential. People have to see it, especially given the current political buffoonery plaguing our country, the outright deceit and historical revisionism enabled by this "putanginang" government. As polemic, the movie is compelling. Its anger is infectious, and more importantly, coherent. But then there is also the drama part of this movie, which I thought was its weakness. Philbert Dy's review for Rogue did a better job at articulating my thoughts, and so did J. Neil Garcia's for GMA News. So I'm just gonna say this one thing: the theatricality of this whole film, the language of it, and I mean literally the way it's written--it's jarring, too showy, too bombastic in places that could really use subtlety. Lots of places, really. I came out of the theater feeling like this was the work of someone who, in certain places of the film, just felt tired, like literally tired, and could no longer hear the words he was putting on paper. (Also, Teroy Guzman, hello there, you just reprised this role for "The Kundiman Party," sly bastard, but you were effective anyway.) I don't know about you, but I was baffled by the way the characters spoke many times. We get it: polemics. But hello, "The Normal Heart." So there's that. And also Nonie Buencamino's wig was just awfully done (his roots were showing, for crying out loud!). But still I will recommend this to anyone who asks, because you know, there's also that whole other timely part I mentioned earlier.

I swear, if Jake Gyllenhaal doesn't win an Oscar (or gets at least four more nominations, or five, or ten) before he retires, I will personally write the Academy to tell them they are cancelledT with a capital T. David Gordon Green's STRONGER, less about the 2013 Boston Marathon bombing than about the guy in a wheelchair with his legs newly blown off, is anchored on another Gyllenhaal performance that could have been an easy pick for the Best Actor race if it were any other year. (But then we had Daniel Day-Lewis in "Phantom Thread" and fuckin Elio in CMBYN, to begin with, didn't we?) What does the guy have to do to get nominated again, like come on! It's been more than a decade since "Brokeback Mountain," and many of us are still angry about the "Nightcrawler" snub. Here is an actor who has been endlessly fearless with the roles he plays, who isn't afraid to get and look (and probably feel) ugly. The movie has its high notes, meaning it also has its blah notes, but what I will single out is the director's eye for the crowd scenes--when Jeff Bauman's crazy, dysfunctional family enters and fills the picture, and that bravura last-quarter sequence that finally shows us the immediate aftermath of the bombing with Bauman at its center. And sure, Tatiana Maslany got some Supporting Actress recognition for her work here, because yeah she does great work here, but what about Miranda Richardson as Bauman's overbearing mom, huh? Such a waste.

I don't know why I still watch MODERN FAMILY. The first two seasons were great. Season 2's Halloween episode remains one of my tops. Seasons 3 and 4 were okay. But then by Season 5 we were all probably thinking hmmm what the hell happened. And now I just finished Season 9 and it was pretty uneven, just like the past few seasons. I don't even think this qualifies as a guilty pleasure, since sometimes there's very little pleasure to be had with an episode. I'll call this a habit--my "Modern Family" habit. Hopefully it ends with Season 10.

Turning 26

Victoria Peak, December 2017.

When I turned 25 a year ago, it was a different world then. I was coming home to Iloilo after two weeks in Dumaguete as a fellow to the 56th Silliman University National Writers Workshop. For lack of a less cliché sentiment, those were two of the best weeks of the year. I'd submitted my application on a whim, after thinking I wouldn't even make the deadline, already somehow resigned that I'd never be part of the workshop's history. 

I spent a good part of that birthday transiting in the marketplace that was Mactan Airport. There were no direct flights from Dumaguete to Iloilo, and I was determined to be home before evening, so I'd booked the early morning flight to Cebu and boarded the plane hungover from the previous night's farewell festivities. I didn't mind the blur of it all; the mental haze somehow made the day all the more deviant and, thus, exciting. In a week, I'd be in Bicol with two of my best friends from high school; in two more, I'd be in Japan, for the first time, with my mother and brother.

When I turned 26 yesterday, I'd had three hospitalizations within a span of five months--first, for H. pylori gastritis three days before Christmas last year; then for an appendectomy last month, and a readmission after that operation for partial gut obstruction.

I'd spent a good seven months back in Iloilo, eased into a routine so far off from the toxic, patient-filled life of residency training I'd envisioned.  

I'd seen 52 movies since New Year's, aside from a number of TV series, plus a pirated copy of the filmed version of London's National Theater's "Angels in America." I'd read more non-medical books than I could recall reading within a similar length of time (among those books, David Mitchell's "Black Swan Green," Wilfredo Pascual's "Kilometer Zero," Mookie Katigbak-Lacuesta's "Burning Houses").

I'd seen what will probably be the most atrocious production of Jonathan Larson's "Rent" I will ever see in this lifetime, and also a so-so touring production of "The Lion King," the source movie being one of the defining movies of my youth.

I'd gone on a supposedly secret, 24-hour trip to Hong Kong very few people knew about. 

And my father had been gone for just a little over seven months. It's this last bit, I suppose, that's fueling this emotional logorrhea. It's hard to believe it's been that long, but you can do nothing else but believe it, y'know.

Screen Log 13: The Death of Stalin; Mother!; Breathe; Hostiles; Fresh Off the Boat Season 4

"Hostiles."

What a delight--what a refreshing delight--Armando Iannucci's THE DEATH OF STALIN was! Cold, British deadpan satire perfectly executed. I was hooked from start to finish. The decision to give this historical fiction contemporary finishes, especially the language and accents, was excellent. And that cast! And that script! Three slots in the Golden Globes for Musical/Comedy went to "The Disaster Artist," "The Greatest Showman" and "I, Tonya," when very clearly, here was the year's funniest film. One of the nastiest, but also the funniest. I will certainly be watching this again in the near future.

As for Darren Aronofsky's MOTHER!, I was amazed only by Jennifer Lawrence's consistency--by her capacity to keep the same, baffled-slash-shocked-slash-appalled expression for all of two hours. Aronofsky can go fool another crowd with this piece of Biblical blather, but not me. I was watching the entire thing unfold, wishing it could reach the end faster.

Andy Serkis' directorial debut, the disability drama BREATHE, stars one of the best actors of his generation and currently working, Andrew Garfield, whose Prior Walter in "Angels in America" is a stunning, fabulous creation. Here, Garfield is confined to a bed, then to a wheelchair, with a tube glued to his neck, for 90% of the film. Claire Foy does her best to set Elizabeth's shell aside (but she just can't, or is it just me? So effective and indelible is she in "The Crown.") The rest of the cast and the rest of this story are rather forgettable. Sometimes affecting, occasionally tearjerking, mostly forgettable.

Scott Cooper's HOSTILES is beautifully shot: vistas of the Great Plains in just about every weather and every light. And Rosamund Pike in tears in just about every imaginable situation. I'm being hyperbolic, of course. This is an emotional Western. An emotional Western! Christian Bale takes the lead, speaking so softly, even Apple earphones have a hard time catching his words occasionally. But the effort to depart from genre convention, though. You can almost hear Cooper's brain tick and tock throughout his film. The fight scenes, especially, all feel so contrived and cheaply choreographed. And the story itself hardly surprises; you can practically predict every twist and turn of the plot. And for this level of predictability, the film's length is not justified.

I still maintain that the third season of FRESH OFF THE BOAT was its best. The fourth one was still good, though there were a couple of episodes that weren't up to par, I thought. The third season was simply slam dunk after slam dunk. Still, Constance Wu remained the series' biggest asset, followed by Lucille Soong. And if ABC had the right mind, they'd renew this show for two more seasons at least.

PDI Feature: Joaquin Valdes in 'Miss Saigon'

I haven't written something like this since I was running the campus paper in high school, so this was muscle (brain?) memory doing all the work. The online version of the article here.

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Joaquin Valdes: From secret depression to 'Miss Saigon'-UK

Repertory Philippines' "Vanya and Sonia and Masha and Spike" (2017), where Valdes played the beefcake bimbo Spike. With Mica Pineda.

"I had already said goodbye to 'Miss Saigon,'" says Joaquin Valdes, who officially joined the musical's United Kingdom-Ireland touring production two weeks ago in Manchester. He is part of the male ensemble, as well as 2nd cover (or understudy) for the role of Thuy, currently played by fellow Filipino artist Gerald Santos.

In 2012, when the "Miss Saigon" team came to the Philippines to cast the now-closed West End revival (which coincided with the musical's 25th anniversary), Valdes was one of those who did not audition. "I had a stable job in advertising, and my fiancée was in the middle of law school," he says.

A few years later, he arrived at a quandary. With a Film degree from the University of the Philippines-Diliman, he had entered the world of advertising for its stability. Now, despite the good pay, he no longer found the work fulfilling.

"I had built a name for myself as a director, but making glossy TV ads was just disconnecting me from my art," he says. "I was secretly depressed."

When auditions for the aforementioned "Saigon" tour came in 2016, Valdes was already looking for a way out--"an excuse to leave," he says. He tried his luck, but didn't make the cut.

It was a lot of "struggling and wrestling with myself," but the rejection also kindled a kind of 11 o'clock number for Valdes. "I realized that my depression was rooted in my desire to return to my first love, and that I didn't need to wait for a 'Miss Saigon' to do what I wanted to do."

Right mind-set

That first love, of course, is the theater, whose limelight Valdes has known since he was in grade school, when he was cast in Repertory Philippines' 1995 production of "Evita."

And so early last year, Valdes quit his job in advertising and started applying for theater-related Master's degree programs abroad. In fact, when the chance came for a self-taped audition for the "Saigon" tour extension, he had already been offered a slot in a university in Britain.

He landed the part in "Saigon" mere days after sending in his tape. "I guess the universe knows when you're ready. I first auditioned wanting to leave an industry I was miserable in. But that wasn't the right mind-set," he says.

Now his contract binds him to the production for one year, taking him and his wife to cities such as Bristol (where the show opens next week), Plymouth, and Zurich, Switzerland.

"The decision to leave the Philippines was a hard one," he says. It was going to happen whether or not I got accepted into 'Saigon.' I want to build a career in a craft I love and know."

For someone whose resumé flaunts acclaimed turns in local productions of Tony Award winners such as "Spring Awakening," "Red" and "Matilda, The Musical," Valdes confesses his career as an actor in the country has been anything but stable.

Industry limitations

"There are limitations in our industry," he says, "and it's hardly an industry because there's hardly an audience. We have a growing number of theater companies and an endless cistern of talent, but where is the audience that will sustain the work? Even big casino theaters can't always fill their seats. And we're hardly represented in the public sector. We don't even have labor laws to protect theater businesses and actors."

As Lea Salonga, Joanna Ampil and Rachelle Ann Go have shown, a stint in "Saigon" can lead to a myriad of possibilities. Still, Valdes chooses to take everything one day at a time.

"My focus now is to do good work," he says, "sing and act and stay on top of my game. Earn my keep."

"Hopefully when I come back," Valdes adds, "I'll be a much better performer and a more empathizing person. But I'll likely do what I've always done--hustle. Only difference will be I'd have more world experience to hustle harder."

Screen Log 12: Downsizing; God's Own Country; Phantom Thread; Film Stars Don't Die in Liverpool; Roman J. Israel, Esq.

"Film Stars Don't Die in Liverpool."

After watching DOWNSIZING, I felt embarrassed for its director Alexander Payne. It's painful to watch someone stumble, especially if it's someone whose work you've long admired--"Sideways," "About Schmidt," "The Descendants," even "Nebraska." If I didn't know any better, I'd say Payne should just go back to his American road trips, into Californian wine country, Hawaiian plantations, the Midwest. This latest effort had a great concept that went nowhere, while also birthing a multitude of storylines that ended in a narrative muddle. The saving grace here was really Hong Chau, who truly deserved that Best Supporting Actress slot far more than the likes of Octavia Spencer (no offense to Minnie the poop-pie maker).

The balls of this Francis Lee to make a gay farmland movie! But really, "Brokeback Mountain" should be the first thing that comes to mind when talking about the much-acclaimed GOD'S OWN COUNTRY. I didn't fall head over heels for this one. I'm still waiting for that gay movie that will top (Haha!) Andrew Haigh's "Weekend" from 2011--still one of the best LGBTQ films of the 21st century for me. Lee's movie is no slouch, but it's nothing novel either. Well, the extended bits with the sheep, maybe.

Then we have Paul Thomas Anderson's PHANTOM THREAD, which The New Yorker called "propaganda for toxic masculinity." I was amused by that article, by how the author completely missed the point. This movie dripped its venom as if it were pouring tea, fancy British style. That script was hilarious--the cattiness, the shade, the sarcasm--it ought to have been the frontrunner for Original Screenplay, really. And Jonny Greenwood's music was simply remarkable in the way it eased the viewer right into the world of this film, then almost two hours later, subverting expectations. Here I was, thinking I was just watching Daniel Day-Lewis (great) and Lesley Manville (greater) try to out-polite-sardonic each other, and then we get to the mushrooms! Mushrooms and gowns! Who would have thought they'd make such a poisonous pair?

You know what I realized after watching FILM STARS DON'T DIE IN LIVERPOOL? Frances McDormand's performance in "Three Billboards Outside Ebbing, Missouri" should have been in sixth place, because her spot ought to have gone to Annette Bening, so brilliant and luminous and affecting in this movie about Gloria Grahame's final days. How many times has the Academy ignored Bening? BAFTA had the sense to nominate her, but that was at the expense of Meryl Streep. The film itself doesn't quite measure up to Bening's talent; it's another case of go see the movie to see the star performance anchoring it. There's a part near the end that shows the same scene from two perspectives, and that's where I felt the film weaken tremendously, turn flimsy and redundant. (They should have just stuck with Bening's perspective, by the way.) So now the question is, when will she win her Oscar, hmm? When is the Academy going to wake up and realize she's one of the most overdue?

ROMAN J. ISRAEL, ESQ. is just sad. I feel sad for Dan Gilroy, the director, whose "Nightcrawler" I so adored. I feel sad for Denzel Washington, in a performance so mannered it's as if he were trying to pry himself loose from the entire project. I mean, they give him that awful hair for half of the film! Mostly I feel sad for all the actors who had to deliver all those unconvincing lines. And also all the actors who were robbed of an Oscar, Golden Globe and SAG slot by Denzel, in a performance that's nowhere near his best. Denzel, the great actor, so laboriously acting, as A.A. Dowd of A.V. Club called it. What an awful, stilted movie this is. The beginning (with all that typed narration) is shitty. The middle is shitty. And the end is shitty. What an insult to the craft of fiction and film.

PDI Feature: 2018 UST National Writers' Workshop

In today's Inquirer--the online link here--I write a surface-level piece on this year's UST National Writers' Workshop, where I was a fellow for poetry in English. 

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At the UST Writers' Workshop, a literary vision of the future

This year's University of Santo Tomas (UST) National Writers' Workshop, organized by the UST Center for Creative Writing and Literary Studies (CCWLS), had 15 fellows, the most number of participants since its revival seven years ago. We had a screenwriter (Nigel Santos); two playwrights (Gil Nambatac and Manuel Tinio); four essayists (Kristine Estioko, Ria Valdez, Bayani Gabriel and Riddick Recoter); four fictionists (Yan Baltazar, Pat Onte, Keanu Reyes and Karl "Kid" Orit); and four poets (Edmark Tan, Hans Malgapu, Soc delos Reyes and this writer).

The increase in number coincided with a calendar shift. From its usual midyear perch, the weeklong workshop, held at Ridgewood Residences in Baguio City, was moved to March. This, we were told, was a precaution against the weather: Last year, the rains of late July left the entire workshop contingent unexpectedly stranded in the mountain city for an extra day.

This date change, however, concurred with a rather hectic period of the academic calendar, which meant some members of the teaching panel--"powerful women," as they were lovingly labeled--couldn't make it for the entire week, if at all. "Just in case you're wondering why we have an almost-all-male panel," Ned Parfan, poet and workshop coordinator, clarified during the orientation.

Dawn Laurente Marfil was the only female member of the original panel, which included Parfan, Ralph Semino Galán, Augusto Antonio "Tots" Aguila, Paul Castillo, Joselito "Joey" delos Reyes, Nestor Cuartero, Chuckberry Pascual, Inquirer Lifestyle Arts and Books editor Lito Zulueta, and John Jack Wigley, who was also workshop director.

Cristina Pantoja Hidalgo, CCWLS director, had to miss the workshop for personal reasons. The only time we fellows met her was when she came aboard the bus in UST to tell us she was, sadly, staying behind. "If my smile looks a bit pained, it's because I couldn't join the group this year," she later wrote on Facebook, referring to the obligatory predeparture photos we took in front of the university's iconic Main Building.

Sweet surprise

The sweet surprise turned out to be Filipino-American writer R. Zamora Linmark, who was only hitching a ride to Baguio, but there and then offered his services to be part of the panel.

So it was that we trooped up north with sweaters, turtlenecks and fleece jackets in tow, the temperature dipping to as low as 14°C in early morning.

Cocooned in the hotel's sixth-floor conference room, we averaged seven literary pieces a day--and that was honestly no walk in the park. But we were also well-nourished, the meals and coffee breaks peppered generously throughout our schedule, and the balconies affording vistas of the neighboring Mansion House and the city's ubiquitous pine trees if ever one sought a chilly breather.

The tearing apart and subsequent reconstruction of our works was nothing if not expected. Linmark's critiques, for instance, proved to be some of the most memorable, especially his emphasis on editing--on killing our proverbial darlings. "What sounds nice doesn't always make sense," he said, more than once, with an eye particularly directed at the poetry fellows.

Gémino Abad, who was a guest panelist, unfailingly stressed his three-word mantra on writing: "saysay," or meaningfulness; "diwa," the literary work's moral dimension; and "datîng," pertaining to the effect and power a work has on the reader. After all, "the subject of all writing is the human experience," he said. "What is most real is what is most imagined."

'Touchy' Jerry Gracio

Meanwhile, acclaimed screenwriter and poet Jerry Gracio, our other guest panelist, said that for a literary work to be considered effective, "Dapat nahihipo niya ako (It has to touch me)."

Gracio also lauded the fact that most of the pieces were parts of bigger projects, from lyric sequences to traditional poetry or short story collections. "Dapat ang end-product na iniisip natin ay isang libro, o kaya nama'y isang pelikula, ganoon (The end-product we should already be thinking of is a book or a film)."

On the way back to Manila, one couldn't help mulling over Gracio's words: the books and plays and movies to be read and viewed in the years to come, all by writers cloistered in a bus descending the winding mountain road. An apt challenge, if ever there was one, and a promising vision of the future.

'The Death of Cleopatra'

My first published ekphrastic poem! Also, first published work in Asia outside the Philippines. This poem is really just me making peace with the fact that I couldn't go to Singapore and see the painting in the flesh. Hyperlink to my poem in this issue of Quarterly Literary Review Singapore.

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The Death of Cleopatra
Juan Luna (c. 1881)

"Luna depicted the Egyptian queen's suicide at the moment of its discovery: dressed in royal regalia, Cleopatra had just expired, along with a maid who just collapsed on the floor and another, on the verge of falling down. Barely seen at the foot of a pillar is the tail of a snake slithering away..."
--Philippine Daily Inquirer

She dreams in tongues. Words I haven't for the rich billow

of green and garnet robes splayed around her. Drunk

on the serpent's fond kiss, she feigns blindness,

pretends to be mute and deaf--inanimate, really. But I'm familiar

with the scrutiny of strangers, the kind she will never admit

she yearns for. Eyes tracing the tender curve of her breasts,

the waxen sheen of her arm, the concealed navel.

Long after the pyramids have crumbled and the great peninsula

spliced by a sliver of water, we will still think of her lovely

face, birthing maps in placid slumber: marble obelisks

carved from her cheeks, and the flesh of her lips

swapped for dunes stretching across Cairo's peripheries.

Speak up, darling, loud and clear. Is that a smile she's failing

to bury? Just the slightest hint of satisfaction, warm as venom

in her veins, the future grown soft in the folds of her palms.

Screen Log 11: Split; A Quiet Place; Blade Runner 2049; Baby Driver; Logan

"Blade Runner 2049."

Finally got around to watching M. Night Shyamalan's SPLIT. James McAvoy's drop-dead terrific in it, but man, Betty Buckley was one shit psychiatrist. I mean, going to the patient's house in the dead of night? Harboring secrets you know would do way more harm than good? Had she survived, she should have been stripped of her license. Quack!

Also, finally saw A QUIET PLACE, directed by John Krasinski and starring him and his wife Emily "Some-hideous-skirt-convention-you-have-to-go-to" Blunt. I saw this on the first "Avengers: Infinity War" weekend, and the cinema still drew a sizable crowd, who squirmed and shrieked and screamed at the right places. I loved this movie, despite its faults. I loved the photography, the sound, Emily Blunt, the world-building. I could point out the flaws in the story, how many of the things that took place were contrivances. But I won't. Because I really enjoyed this film. And isn't that all that matters sometimes? But I would still feed Millicent Simmonds' character to the beasts, no question about it, spoiled brat.

I still don't get the appeal of BLADE RUNNER 2049. Yes, it's magnificently, astoundingly shot by Roger Deakins. But I really, really agree with Ty Burr of The Boston Globe when he said that somewhere in this nearly three-hour saga is a terrific 100-minute movie. Too long, Denis, just too long. I don't hate this movie; I think it is proficiently, even imaginatively done. But jumping-up-and-down love, you won't get from me.

Such love you also won't get from me for another technical masterpiece of 2017, Edgar Wright's BABY DRIVER. It's really the editing (done in real time, in case you haven't heard) and the music and the sound that are the real stars of this otherwise thinly rendered story. Am I a snob now? The movie just kept losing me whenever Ansel Elgort got out of a car, because then there's really nothing there except actors such as Kevin Spacey and Jamie Foxx and John Hamm hamming it up. The placelessness of it all, I get; the story's supposed to come across as a fever dream, and it does, but it's one dream I can live without. Especially that wobbly, melodramatic-even-by-this-movie's-standards climax.

How. Did. I. Not. Watch. LOGAN. Earlier? And I call myself a fan of the "X-Men" films? (I don't read comics, so. I mean, I remember laying my hands on those comics as a kid, but those days were eons ago.) This new Wolverine movie though. It is very, very good. I do not want to sound like a nutjob of a fan. So I will say that it is very, very good. One more time. For the first time, I actually cared about Hugh Jackman's Wolverine. (I'm a Storm kind of guy, y'know.) But see, children, the wonders you can achieve if you only put a premium on storytelling? On characterization? James Mangold, you are a godsend. Absent James Ivory and his lyrical adaptation of "Call Me by Your Name," and this superhero movie would have been my choice for the Oscar for Best Adapted Screenplay.