‘Ang Araw sa Likod Mo’ Review: Sobering advocacy

In one scene in Dominic Nuesa’s Ang Araw sa Likod Mo, a team of soldiers arrives in an abandoned playground now overrun by weeds and other signs of decay.

The team’s medic (James Lomahan) then starts to lament, plainly explaining how the region ended up in such strife. The Muslims should be here. The Christians should be there. The military shouldn’t be there. He rambles on as he and his comrades make their way out of the sordid reminder of the now distant innocence that was shattered by the staggered war caused by division.

Condensed conflicts

Like the medic’s explanation of the cause of conflict in Mindanao, Nuesa’s film is condensed, perhaps to a fault.

It grants but a mere glimpse of the experiences of direct participants of a war whose beginnings have been muddled by the passage of time and the evolving intentions of those in power. Cinema will never be able to fully portray its complexities. As art, it can be surmised to present its issues as filtered by motivations of the artist and the biases the artist’s motivations naturally dictate.

Ang Araw sa Likod Mo markets itself as an advocacy film, a work whose very existence relies on an objective, which in the film’s case is the awareness of the efforts of Hero Foundation, Inc., an organization that supports the orphans of fallen soldiers.

What is most notable about Nuesa’s film however is its attempt to be as objective as it can in depicting a war in a way where it is not the demons that stand out but the humanity and its many complex plights. The film doesn’t flaunt its commissioned purpose, endeavoring instead to communicate a vision that does more than beg for erstwhile sympathies.

Two narratives

The story isn’t very elaborate, which is apt considering the film limits itself within the couple of days it takes Scout Rangers to locate a wanted terrorist with the help of their informant.

The film splits itself between two narratives.

One follows the soldiers, headed by a tireless sergeant (Ping Medina), who discreetly slog through the forest to complete their mission. This narrative thread meanders, with Nuesa seemingly interested not in the obvious dangers of the profession but on its more relatable facets. The conversations about the romantic relationships they have sacrificed, the families they miss, the faraway hometowns they try so hard to reminisce and the apprehensions they have to ignore are the thread’s highlights.

The other narrative favors traditional drama. It centers on the informant (Bong Cabrera) who decides to help the military to track the wanted jihadist so that he can convince his younger brother (Mike Liwag) who has joined them to escape with him. Unfortunately, Nuesa, in his effort to depict the conflict absent any biases, relies on more convenient resolutions to untangle itself from the issues it nobly presents with the slightest of judgments.

Sensitive subject matter

Other recent films, more notably Baby Nebrida’s problematically conceived Across the Crescent Moon (2017), are very quick to villainize, turning its characters into creatures fueled by simplistic motives, all for the sake of mixing misguided advocacy and brash entertainment. Nuesa is thankfully more thoughtful and responsible. Ang Araw sa Likod Mo is laudable in its sobriety in its treatment of its very sensitive subject matter. – Rappler.com

Francis Joseph Cruz litigates for a living and writes about cinema for fun. The first Filipino movie he saw in the theaters was Carlo J. Caparas’ ‘Tirad Pass.’ Since then, he’s been on a mission to find better memories with Philippine cinema.