Let the Love Begin

Managed to sneak in a movie last Friday night. Earlier in the evening, some fellow dungeon dwellers and I hung around the Katipunan jeepney station across Vinzons Hall for Dulaang Laboratoryo's "Sa Ating Mga Naglalakbay ng Nakayapak." It was a slow burn, and by 9pm, the only significant thing that happened was this girl started yelling, "Hihintaying kita! Hihintayin kita!"

I don't know what happened after that, and psychicpants says that things did get better when they boarded the jeeps, so there. I hied out of the Diliman campus and proceeded to Glorietta. I was determined not to tax my brain anymore, and my friend didn't want to grovel all over Piolo Pascual, so we joined the line at Glorietta for tickets to "Let the Love Begin." This was GMA Films' first movie after a four year absence and after a heavyweight filmography that boasts of Jose Rizal, Muro-Ami and Deathrow. The official iGMA site declares that the film "starts in high school. Pia has the beauty and the wealth. She is the campus sweetheart and the girl of every guy’s dream." Suffice it to say that the character Angel Locsin plays isn't a "beauty and brains" mix. No, no, no: She has "beauty and the wealth." Meanwhile, Richard Gutierrez plays Eric, a cute janitor who attends night school and is somehow portrayed as a very intelligent young man. In another universe, it would have lead to a very Good Will Hunting sort of narrative, but the writing tandem of RJ Nuevas and Suzette Doctolero only wanted us to have a good kilig moment. This should have warned us that we should have parked our brains outside when we parted with whatever little wealth we had to give up to watch this movie. We were looking for lighthearted fare, and lightweight it was.

Let the Love Begin definitely veers away from the usual highbrow fare that GMA Films used to offer. They're now playing Star Cinema's game, and had even somehow beaten Star Cinema at it. Reports have it that LtLB had a better box office showing than Dreamboy. Now that it's been reduced to the battle of the pretty boys, will this be good in the long run? Everyone's complaining that Philippine Cinema is almost dead, dead, and will somebody please kill it already so we can begin a resurrection? But that assumes that there is still life after death. What if all we have is what we have now?

That's it. We're doomed.