"Birthday"
I never really celebrated my birthday, so it was great that I was able to get together with friends last Friday night. It was also a day before Joan's birthday, so it really was more of her birthday than it was mine. Happy birthday Joan!
We had a nice dinner at Congo Grille at El Pueblo, before going off for dessert at Podium. The three amigas (heh) headed home, while the rest of us went to Red Box and sang ourselves silly.
Some pics:
(Uhm, binati niyo kasi eh... nawala tuloy!)
But all the pictures are still at
Jem's photo gallery:
http://www.flickr.com/photos/33931662@N00/sets/46188/
Dr. Roman
Last week, UP Diliman Chancellor Emerlinda Roman was
elected President of the University of the Philippines, becoming the first woman to head the state university. She did this by beating out former Finance Secretary Edgardo Espiritu, who was said to be Malacañang's choice for the post. Despite this, Dr. Roman won because of tremendous support from the UP community.
Earlier, I linked to
an article by former College of Mass Communications Dean Luis Teodoro where he discussed the role of the University of the Philippines in today's society. More recently, both
Conrado de Quiros and UP College of Law Dean
Raul Pangalanan have hailed Dr. Roman's victory and chimed in about the role which Prof. Teodoro discussed earlier.
BALita At Kwentong... BAKla
Anyone who regularly watches Pinoy TV knows that the
BalAKuBak segment from
Nuts Entertainment is the funniest thing on the air. Last Wednesday was a landmark show, even by their standards.
I can't even do it justice writing down what happened if you didn't see the show, or if you have never seen it before, but what the hell, let me try. Our loveable gay anchors were still talking about Jomari's interview on last weekend's Startalk, and told us they had an "exclusive" interview with "Joms" right there on
BalAKuBak.
Out came Pekto with a dead-on impersonation of Jomari's S-Files interview. There's comedy, there's high comedy, and there's Pekto breaking into
What Matters Most as "Joms".
It's not how long we held each other's hand
What matters is how well we loved each other
Addendum
Because of some network problems last night, I ended up posting my previous entry four times. I got rid of the extra posts, but that meant comments from
Bossing Karl (aka fashion photographer Karl Emmanuel) and
JAm were deleted as well, so... sorry!
(Oh well, they had useless suggestions anyway :p)
Anyway, I can't believe I wrote that post about costume parties without mentioning that the last costume party I attended was five years ago, at
Chewy's 18th birthday. There were pretty interesting costumes that night at the party, including Faye B. as the runaway bride, and JAm as a male nurse, but the best costume for me was JR going as Direk Soxy Topacio. And he totally pulled it off, too!
Incidentally, today marks
JR's 23rd birthday!
(
Hehe, hanep sa segway no?)
Superhero
We're having our office Christmas party on December 18, and as per the big boss's instructions, we're having a costume party. To make things more complicated, we had to go as superheroes, supervillains, or
fantaserye characters. They also told us that anyone who didn't come in a costume would be fined Php1,000, while being absent meant taking a hit of Php1,500. You can't go as alter-egos, and you can't risk anything too plain at the risk of being fined.
All this week, talk in the office revolved around ideas for Christmas party costumes. It's given way to more funny than feasible ideas. Someone said that he'll just go as a boy in raggedy clothes holding a small white stone (
Ding... ang bato!). Then someone suggested going to the party in an F4 haircut and tagging along a cute Korean girl ("
Sino ka?" "
Eh 'di si Hero!"). And the one that really cracked me up was the girl who said, "Wouldn't it be funny if you went as Jose Rizal?"
Anyway, last night I was hanging out with
my little sister and I told her about our Christmas party, and for fun, I asked her to help me think about my costume. When I made the inevitable Hero-Sandara joke when I asked her to come as my Sandara, she laughed, and then replied, "
Ano kaya kung pumunta kang Jose Rizal?"
Galing 'no?
But I still have to figure out a costume. I wish I were crazy enough to dye my hair platinum blonde so I could go as Spike from
Buffy the Vampire Slayer. If I could find a realistic-looking visor, I'd go as Cyclops. If all else fails, I'd grow out my sideburns and go as Wolverine (the X-Men movie version).
How about you, got any suggestions?
While we're on the subject
Quark Henares, the director of
Keka and
A Date with Jao Mapa,
posted a message from Erik Matti (
Scorpio Nights 2,
Pedro Penduko II) discussing Erik's new film
Pa-Siyam. It's a very interesting read, and having seen the scary trailer, I'm now inclined to watch the film.
Erik Matti's films always look great, as anyone who has seen his films can attest. It's the stories of his films that have always been the problem. It damn near drove me crazy while watching
Pedro Penduko II when they ruined the perfectly wonderful comedy by making the characters do a dance number, like old-school Pinoy comedies.
Notes
Just an update
on my previous post about
Santa Santita, which I actually cross-posted on my secret online journal (heh) for some comment-whoring. Just some notes on some of the comments:
- IndieFilipino.com critic Alexis Tioseco points out that it was Lee Meily and not Mark Meily who shot Santa Santita. Lee (Mark's wife) also shot (beautifully) Mark's Crying Ladies.
- Director Quark Henares told me to watch Bcuz of U because it's "nice (and heart has an underarm scene OMFG!)." Ano, Jam, game? Hehe.
- Jam wondered why I didn't have anything to write about Angelica Panganiban. I guess it's because there's not much to write about. She gave an adequate performance, and her steamy love scenes with Jericho Rosales are only weird because we all know her as a child star. I still think that Katya Santos would have totally been perfect for the role if she hadn't previously been a bold star.
Santa Santita
Last Wednesday night, after getting off work, I decided to treat myself to a little dinner at El Pollo Loco at Megamall. In between healthy helpings of potato salad and roasted chicken wrapped in pita bread, I decided I didn't feel like going home just yet, and decided to catch a movie's last full show, see I decided to go watch
Santa Santita.
See, I'm a big fan of Filipino films, so much so that if I die and go to hell (which is more than likely), I fully expect the devil to look like Romy Diaz.
As pathetic as the Filipino film industry has been for the past few years, there usually are a couple of releases during the course of the year (before the Metro Manila Film Festival) that look interesting. I usually go out of my way to see these films, at the theaters or at least on VCD, and usually alone because I couldn't entice anyone else to see the Filipino films with me.
It's particularly sad that we're now in November, and
Santa Santita is the first movie this year I was interested in seeing (not counting
Imelda, which was a documentary).
I had guarded expectations from the film, particularly because director Laurice Guillen was at the helm. Her last two films were
Tanging Yaman and
American Adobo, which were both well-acted and well-directed films, but both ultimately fall short with their story-telling.
Besides, I have this beef with
Tanging Yaman. Apart from that the fact that
Tanging Yaman was released in the same year as
Deathrow and
Tuhog and overshadowed both (infinitely better movies), I believe that movie set the Philippine movie industry a few years back.
Did you notice that every "quality" local film that comes out these days are nothing but re-hashed melodramas with all-star casts (as big families)? All of these films were just trying to follow the
Tanging Yaman formula.
I had problems with
Santa Santita, although the movie certainly had its moments. Most of these moments came from the strong performances from Johnny Delgado and Jericho Rosales. Johnny Delgado just might be the best actor in Philippine cinema today, and with Jericho Rosales' performance, he just might be the most important one.
The other cast members did reasonably well enough, and this underscores Laurice Guillen's skill in directing actors. The movie had another little gem with a cameo from Ricky Davao, who just might be the best actor in Philippine cinema if it weren't for Johnny Delgado weren't so darn good.
The technical aspects were also great, with Quiapo coming alive on the big screen (Mark Meilly of
Crying Ladies was DP). The handheld techniques Laurice Guillen used for the conversation shots were also effective.
But the film ultimately disappointed me, because while the acting and the shots wergreat, the storytelling was so-so. The other elements in the movie were infinitely more interesting (the culture of paying women for prayers, the troubled priest, the unhappy nun, Quiapo itself), but the movie plodded on with its main plot to deliver its message.
I don't understand why "quality" Filipino films have to have a "message", or rather, why the director has to go out of his/her way hammer that "message" onto our heads. Just like in
Tanging Yaman, Laurice Guillen, a Marian devotee, just can't leave the story well enough on its own, and she has to bombard us with her message of salvation. To make matters worse, cheap mediocre melodrama is used to deliver this very same message. You know, the type that makes for good
Eat... Bulaga acting contests but bad cinema.
Of course, "intelligent" showbiz writers and moralists alike would point to this "message" as the reason why
Santa Santita, and
Tanging Yaman, for that matter, are such great movies.
But
Santa Santita is not a great movie, and I guess that was what disappointed me most about the film. It's sad because there is a great movie somewhere in this film, but the director just didn't want to bring it out.
The funniest man in the world
I became a big fan of Chris Rock's back since college, after downloading his stand-up material off Napster. I liked his work so much that I brought it to our apartment in LB, and soon enough Oliver was mouthing off the lines from Rock's now-(in)famous
Niggas vs. Black People stand-up act.
Niggas always want some credit for some shit they supposed to do. For some shit they just supposed to do: A nigga will brag about some shit a normal man just does. A nigga will say some shit like, "I take care of my kids."
You're supposed to, you dumb mothafucka. What are you talkin' about? What are you braggin' about? What kind of ignorant shit is that?
"I ain't never been to jail."
What do you want, a cookie?!?
His words were loud, biting, shocking, funny, controversial, highly intelligent and most importantly, effective, both as social commentary and as stand-up comedy.
Anyway, The Onion AV Club has
a rockin' interview with the funniest man in the world.
Buckley
Part of the reason
The OC is so great, aside from the witty banter (and despite all the homoerotic undertones of Ryan and Seth's relationship) is the music on the show. The other night, for example, in a repeat episode, the show ended with Jeff Buckley's haunting cover of
Hallejujah, to chilling effect.
Because of that, I've been listening to Jeff Buckley for the past couple of days. I couldn't get the lines from
Lover, You Should've Come Over out of my head.
It's never over, my kingdom for a kiss upon her shoulder...
And what do you know, while looking for lyrics, I found out that it was Jeff Buckley's birthday yesterday. Cool!
Just thought I'd mention it...
Alvin Patrimonio
announced his retirement from Philippine basketball last night, on his 38th birthday. He stayed just long enough to pass the torch to the new guys. It's about time too, since it's widely believed that he's been playing with a knee injury for the last six years, and he has never been quite the same.
He won four MVP trophies, scored 15,000 points, grabbed more than 5,000 rebounds, and was Kris Aquino's first celebrity boyfriend. Oh, and he got his nickname stolen from him by now-Senator Bong Revilla.
His last outing was a game against FedEx (starring ex-buddy Jerry Codinera) a couple of weeks ago, which
Jem and I actually saw live. I'm saving the ticket stubs from that one.
Lyrics
I.
Speak now or forever fall to pieces
I took to you so fast
The way we are is just a movie sequence
I took to you so...
II.
And I wonder...
If everything could ever feel this real forever
If anything could ever be this good again
III.
So I sidled down beside her, settled down and shouted,
Hi, there!
My name is Stewart Ransom Miller, I'm a serial lady killer.
She said,
I'm already dead.
That's exactly what she said.
IV.
You were lying wide awake in the garden,
trying to get over your stardom
And I could never see you departing,
you're my baby... you're just another girl
V.
She's electric
She's from a family full of eccentrics
She's done things that I'd never expected
And I need more time
VI.
Sounds of laughter, shades of earth are ringing
Through my open ears inciting and inviting me
Limitless undying love which shines around me like a
million suns and calls me on and on...
O-ha-o-hi-o!
I woke up very early this morning, at about 4:30 am, for no reason at all. I tried going back to sleep but I couldn't so I ended up just turning on the television to watch some
election coverage on CNN while playing a few turns of
Civ3 Conquests.
The polling hadn't been closed when I left the house at 7:30 earlier, but I've been watching the events unfold over the Internet the moment I came in here at the office.
The
early exit polls indicated good things for John Kerry in battleground states, which was affirmed by Kerry's win in Pennsylvania just a few moments ago, but the networks just called Florida in favor of Bush. Now they're saying Kerry needs to win Ohio to stay in the race, so let's hope Ohio comes through.
Andyan pa naman sina Ian, Jona, at Justine...
Working late
I got a call earlier this afternoon from my future boss
at the company I'll be working for, saying I needed to report to work ASAP, because they need me for some stuff. Tsk, tsk,
kailangan talaga nila ng artista. Hehe.
Right now I'm working late trying to wrap everything up before I leave. I hadn't actually had to work late in quite a while. Which sucks, because I'm missing tonight's episode of "The O.C." (I think they're showing the first season's finale tonight).
At least there'll be a re-run of that this weekend, but I'll also be missing
Mulawin, which now features Angel Locsin in a sexy costume with a bare midriff (which makes me take back everything
I previously said about the show).
Oh well.
