Bagong Bayani is the best Filipino film since Orapronobis in the late 1980's

Bagong Bayani is the underdog of the two films about Flor  Contemplacion: made in two months on a shoestring budget, it's been  plagued by unaccountable production delays (due to pressure from Viva,  perhaps?), and so far no theater has agreed to release it, so the  closest you might get to it is through this review. Which is a filthy  shame: Bagong Bayani is the best Filipino film since Orapronobis in the  late 1980's.  Instead of a career devoted to skin flicks, Aguiluz sharpened his teeth  on documentaries. He pours that not inconsiderable experience into this  film: parts of actual interviews mix deftly with dramatizations of  specific episodes; the outside and inside of Changi prison were filmed  with hidden cameras (Aguiluz reportedly dressed as a turbaned Indian to  film the prison gates; when a guard spotted him, he literally had to  run to save the film footage).  From the first frame onwards it's obvious that this is not going to be  your usual Carlos J. Caparas massacre flick. Flor Contemplacion (Helen  Gamboa) is led, bare-footed, to the gallows; she is followed by a  restless camera, seeking her out from every angle--hand-held, tilted,  low-angled, panning. The execution itself happens swiftly in a series  of shots so fluidly cut they have the smoothness and finality of a  hanged man's sperm emission.  The film shifts back to Flor's interrogation: she is forced to stand  for hours, deprived of food and water, while the CID officer (an  intensely convincing Pen Medina) strikes her. I was told that this was  the first time Helen Gamboa gave a real performance. If so, it was  worth the wait; Gamboa is riveting as she shows us the final stages of  exhaustion without resorting to the standard excess hysterics of  Filipino acting.  It's said that Chanda Romero wants to sue this film, because the part  of Flor was promised to her. But her performance as Delia Maga is no  disappointment. She's always been an extremely talented actress, and  her acting has never felt more honest and open than here. The scene  where she discovers her ward drowned is especially fine: having a good  idea as to what her employer might do to her, she picks up the phone  and literally has to force herself to call him; you can see the terror  in her trembling hands. But her best moments are spent with her fellow  actress. Romero and Gamboa establish an easy but close rapport; we  sense the loneliness that draws them together. The fact that their  employers allow them to see each other about once a week only  strengthens the tie.  Aguiluz underlines the enforced isolation by showing us Flor's room: a  tiny cubicle nearly filled up by a single cot, where a hi-tech TV set  that must have cost a month's wages has to sit on the room's one  folding chair. Flor, in being convicted, had only exchanged one prison  for another, a living death for a real death. One shot actually  illustrates this visually: as Flor climbs the apartment stairs to meet  Delia Maga for the last time, the camera follows her past darkened  corridors and bright windows as if she was fading in and out, her  existence uncertain.  One of the film's finest sequences takes place inside Changi prison,  where Flor meets Virginia Parumog. Their early scenes have a  deliciously tentative feel, as Virginia tries to draw Flor out of her  torture-and-drug-induced shell, and their friendship begins to firm. I  have rarely seen acting--Filipino acting--as delicately played as this.  As examples of female bonding, these short scenes (plus those between  Flor and Delia) put the more expensive and supposedly more talented  cast of Little Women to shame.  Irma Adlawan as Virginia gives an astonishing performance: warm,  intelligent, deeply compassionate. She senses Flor's enormous need, and  her strength and sympathy grow to match that need. In one scene,  Virginia reads a note smuggled to her by Flor. While Gamboa narrates  Flor's suffering, Adlawan suggests--by the inwardness of her crouch,  the bend of her neck--how deeply she feels Flor's words. Aguiluz  clothes her in shadows, implying Virginia's total immersion in Flor's  state of mind, a state of near-total despair. It's a tribute to the  director and both actresses that with the simplest of devicesa  crouched posture, a bit of darkness, and a voice-over--they bring us  totally inside the souls of these two women.  It's instructive to see how The Flor Contemplacion Story and Bagong  Bayani stage identical scenes: when the children visit their mother in  Flor, Lamangan plunks a glass sheet wide as a panoramic movie screen  between them, the better to see Nora act; Aguiluz chooses  verisimilitude, using a cramped little barred window. This effectively  forces the children to contort uncomfortably to see her face, making  you think: they aren't even allowed a good look at their mother. In  Flor, Lamangan forces Nora to dominate the scenes; in Bayani, Aguiluz  has them talk as normal people in their situation talk: greetings  first, then important business, then small talk, then despairing  silence. The progression happens quietly and naturally; finally Flor  and her children are reduced to pressing their palms to each other  through the glass.  The mix of dramatization and documentary recalls The Thin Blue Line,  about the arrest and conviction of an innocent man for murder. Line  attempted to deconstruct events, repeating them over and over again  until you see the contradictions in the prosecution's case against the  accused; Bayani assumes Flor's innocence, giving the Singaporean  version only a token glance. It might have helped Bayani's case to  adopt a more objective tone, giving time to both sides (but then, we  wouldn't have all these wonderful performances). As it is, Bayani  doesn't seem concerned with the question of guilt so much as with  depicting Flor's life, at which it succeeds, vividly. The use of  documentary footage broadens the implications of her story, turning it  into the story of all OCWs abroad.  From The Manila Chronicle, June 95

The documentary is a form of non-fiction storytelling that aims to present factual information, insights, and perspectives on real-world subjects, events, issues, or people. Documentaries can cover a wide range of topics, including history, science, culture, social issues, nature, biographies, and more.

Dziga Vertov in Man with a Movie Camera (1929)

The family genre features stories specifically created to be suitable for a wide range of age groups within a family. Family-oriented content is designed to be enjoyed by both children and adults, often providing entertainment that is wholesome, relatable, and appropriate for all members of a family to watch or experience together.

Drew Barrymore and Pat Welsh in E.T. the Extra-Terrestrial (1982)

This documentary takes a hard look at the facts about the Filipina domestic, an Overseas Contract Worker (OCW) hanged in Singapore for the murder of her friend and fellow OCW, the nursemaid Della Maga. It documents Flor's accusation, confession, four years spent in prison, the lack of quality defensive support from the Philippine government and subsequent inaction when new evidence raised doubt about her guilt and the suggestion that Maga may have been killed by her employer. The chilling story is told with a combination of dramatic reenactment and documentary footage.

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