When I think of Philippine cinema,
certain things come to mind: exaggerated soap operas, bad acting
and trite dialogues…at least those are what I remember. I left
Manila to live in the United States when I was twelve years old,
and I haven’t seen a Filipino movie ever since. I am almost 27
now, and since my departure, I have seen films from all over the
world…Vietnam, Denmark, Mexico, Iran…. but haven’t once come
across a movie from my homeland. That is until “American Adobo”.
However, despite a well-meaning effort to put Philippine cinema
on the map, “American Adobo” just proves that I haven’t missed a
lot, for the movie suffers from…. well…. exaggerated soap
operas, bad acting and trite dialogues.
Like countless other ethnic films, "Adobo"'s opening shots are
of food preparation. So you might be asking yourself, “What is
an adobo?”. Well, it is a Philippine meat dish marinated with
vinegar and garlic. It has in some way become the symbol for
Filipino cuisine and culture, and hence the film’s title.
“Adobo” follows a group of five Filipino-American friends living
in New York. There is Marissa (Dina Bonnevie), beautiful and
intelligent, yet she always ends up with guys who treat her like
dirt. There is Mike (Christopher de Leon), an unhappily married
husband to a mahjongg-obsessed shrew. There is Gerry (Ricky
Davao), a closeted gay man who can’t bear to think of coming out
to his mother. There is Raul (Paolo Montalban), a cocky hunk who
may have slept with one too many girls. Then there is Tere
(Cherry Pie Picache), a lonesome woman who is tired of being a
goody-goody. They are five friends who look to each other for
consolation when it comes to life’s unbearables.
In what could have been an effective remake of Kasdan’s “The Big
Chill” or Branagh’s “Peter’s Friends”, “American Adobo” suffers
terribly from amateurish filmmaking. From the onset, the
dialogue serves nothing more than to push the plot. It is
uninspired and so unnatural that I hope nobody converses that
way. These characters talk about so many issues ranging from
justice and religion to AIDS and politics, but we learn nothing
new.
The film is unforgivably choppy as it moves from one story to
another, for the screenplay tries so hard to give equal amounts
of time to each character. Predictability is another pressing
problem. Once the situations are set up for each character, you
know exactly where the stories will eventually end up. Everybody
say "cliché."
Then there is the excessive
melodramatics, exemplified by one scene that was supposed to be
touching, but which I found to be a joke. It is when Tere just
found out that her boyfriend has been seeing another woman. She
slams the phone down and has to release her anger somehow. So,
she turns over the chair while hysterically screaming…. then
throws a vase across the room…. then uproots a plant (still
hysterically screaming)…. then she looks around the room to see
what else she can destroy…. oh yeah, the sofa cover hasn’t been
touched yet…. and on and on. In what may have been a scene for
sympathy became one that is to be laughed at. On top of all
this, the acting was generally genuinely fake. I mean some of
these people are the biggest box-office draws in the Phillipines
(the Julia Roberts and the Tom Cruises, if you may), but when
you make a slipping scene look so fake, it’s shameful.
However, there are some few bright spots in the film. The film
shines when it goes for the lighthearted rather than the
serious. There are moments that are authentically funny. Also,
in a rather blah ensemble cast, two of them gave great
performances. Christopher de Leon, considered to be the best
dramatic actor in the Philippines of all time, did a really
great job as Mike. Also, Gloria Romero (who has been around a
very long time and who has sort of a Bette Davis status there)
gave an indubitably notable and endearing supporting performance
as Gerry’s mother.
Nevertheless, from the very start, one can tell that this is a
second-rate movie. It has good intentions, but when the rest of
the world creates respectable and much superior films,
intentions are not enough to make anything stand out. I know
that the Philippine’s golden age of filmmaking is yet to come,
but “American Adobo” isn’t the one to initiate it.
