Desperadas

Ladies and gentlemen, let me present one of this year's entries for MMFF. Directed by Paul Wilson Gardon, it stars Ruffa Gutierrez, Rufa Mae Quinto, Iza Calzado and Marian Rivera, and it is about four women who… ah what the heck writing synopsis is so boring, so please just read it elsewhere. 

I give you, Desperadas. Click that link, view the trailer, read the synopsis, and then come back to me.

My thoughts?

This is a fantastic showmanship of creative prowess! It totally does not remind me of Desperate Housewives. In fact, this movie's name couldn't resemble that sitcom less! 

Seriously, what is the deal?! Movies like this are made, and then nominated for MMFF (which should stand for Many Mucus Festering Forward)? Should I be saddened that the Philippine cinema is, once again after a Billion times, imitating another popular Hollywood show? Should I be amused that this particular movie is aping a show that has not been very kind to Filipinos? Should I laugh at how movies like this are considered "worthy of accolades"? Or should I be angry that it stars Ruffa Gutierrez, an obnoxious celebrity hall-of-(in)famer? Gee I am so ambivalent SOMEBODY PLEASE HELP ME DEVELOP MY EQ WALA AKONG E-KYOOOOOO!!!!!!!111111111111111 

It's bewildering how a lot of Filipino directors refuse to pitch in any original ideas, and instead they are content on copying international films. Why? Don't they feel any shame? It's like none of them ever want to take risks and make movies that change people, and all they do is create formulaic "sure box office hits" that do not have any relevant messages, but will sell anyway because people will eat them up so they could see all these sexy actresses and corny scenarios. "Nevermind that we're giving our film industry a negative image, as long as we can earn money and party at Embassy who cares about creativity and all that jazz, right?!" Huzzah! And speaking of sexy actresses, I wonder if Marian Rivera wasn't selected because of her timely popularity. If this movie made last year, would the director even choose her and not Angel Locsin? DING! Didn't think so myself; I guess the only thing important these days is if the actress appears on Men's Magazines™ or not. 

You know what, we need a Desperate Housewives episode that has Teri Hatcher saying, "OK, before we go any further, can I check these scripts? Just to make sure they aren't, like, from some film studio in the Philippines?" And then cue the picket lines of outraged Filipinos crying "racism" and "bigotry", the blogs tossing highfaluting vocabulary (or is it vogue-call-bull-gallery?) to spite American producers for not understanding our real talent, and the fandom-ish comments saying Americans are "gaytards". Then the American producers will counterattack by presenting "Lupin, Asian Treasures, Marimar, and Zaido" as evidences, but Filipinos will curse them anyway for their insensitivity, until someone from the government will "level" the debate by delivering a boring ass speech! Everyone will kiss and make up, and it will back to business for everyone until history repeats. That will be something worth watching, definitely better than wasting your bucks on Desperadas. 

I wonder if we'll get Bayani or Dr. Bahay or Tulak Sampaguita next year.

Quiet Sunday

I'm sure this is a question that has given the world's greatest thinkers many sleepless nights and endless shouting matches that eventually led to fistfights like those common in the Taiwan's House of Congress, but what does THE NIGHTDREAMER do on a quiet Sunday? Because I'm starting to feel sorry about what thinking of me may do to your health, I'll just answer the question. Ain't I the kindest?

(All right, Nightdreamer, knock it off with the fake conceit.)

I rarely get a quiet Sunday, but I won't mention the reasons of that here. After all, I'm NOT EVEN THAT KINDHEARTED SO MAY YOU EARN EVEN MORE SLEEPLESS NIGHTS WONDERING WHY I'M BUSY WAHAHAHAHAHA! Ahem. When I do get a quiet Sunday, like today, I have difficulties doing productive things. Instead, I just spend most of the time in my own room being unfocused.

Today's case can demonstrate how unfocused I can be. I'd nap, surf the internet, read a few chapters of Good Omens, play with my Nintendo DS for a few minutes, listen to music, update my blog, change my mind about updating my blog, eat some junk foods, nap, get out of my room and circle the house without wearing any slippers (which, by the way, does not even match in color), go back to my room, send SMS's, surf the internet, listen to music, open Nightdreamer, log on to my YM, check results of today's NBA games, log off my YM, try again to update my blog, turn off music, turn it on again, play a few other retro videogames on my emulators, etc. You'd have a harder time keeping track of what I'm doing today than you would in trying to understand the plot of a postmodernist novel. 

On any other day, I would think that days like today are infuriatingly boring. Strangely enough for today, however, I'm finding this boredom to be refreshing when contrasted with the events of last week. Last week was crazy. Just read my previous few entries.

No, actually my previous entries did not detail everything. I did not tell you that from last Sunday to last Friday, I slept later than 1 AM. As a result, I was so incredibly tired the entire day yesterday that even if I had originally planned to go out with my friends, I withdrew so that I could go home and sleep. I felt bad about that, but if I didn't go home I could've fainted in the middle of Glorietta and couldn't have waken up even if somebody bombed that place after which the police would come and disseminate that it was caused by an accidental methane gas leak.

But I wasn't merely tired because of lacking sleep. I was tired because of what happened on Friday night.

It was the first time I've ever seen the inside of a room in Victoria Court, or to those who aren't familiar, the room of a love hotel. Err, keep that furrowed brows out of the monitor please; it's not what you think. The people from our office chose this venue for our annual Christmas party. The idea was that the party was to have a retro and 70-ish Austin Powers theme, and since Victoria Court had a so-called Austin Powers room, they took this room for the sake of, um, corporate entertainment.

The room had disco lights that were useless as reading lights, but I guess people don't come to motels to read War and Peace. It even had a cage, a stage for dancing, a twin-sized bed built with a heart shape, a jacuzzi, and a makeout room. And there's a menu of whips or lubricants or some sexy what-have-you's that you can purchase from the motel's delivery service. I cringed at this sight, because it was incredibly bawdy. I also thought that calling this an Austin Powers room was stupid, because it was merely adorned with a few flags of Britain and an Austin Powers logo on the floor. Nothing else from the movie was there, save for a small poster of Mike Myers hanging in that makeout room useful for those who get stimulated when having sex in front of Mike Myers' silly grinning face.

We had our Christmas party. There were some eating and drinking (which wasn't all that bad), but what really was the gist of the event was the group presentation, and preparing for that was precisely what made me very busy in the days before. Our group's hard work paid off, though, because we won the 1st place by doing some silly midget show (which was basically dancing, except the dancers were made to look like midgets). We won P5000 too.

I also received many gifts, like a 1 GB mp3 player which was useless as a music player when compared to my iPod, but useful as a storage device. I also got a copy of Neverwhere by Neil Gaiman. So, yes, I actually enjoyed this event.

There wasn't any sex when I was still around. I left early. If anything had happened to those who remained, I'd rather not know about it.

Two days after and my life is returning to normalcy. Although, bringing the 70-ish retro theme up reminded me of funk music and its psychedelic anarchy. Oh how I love that. Want to hear one? Then click on this.

Richard Jacques - Everybody Jump Around