Throbbing pulse in Alix’s ‘Porno’

 

MANILA, Philippines – Amid this young crowd preoccupied in their discussion on the size or length of Carlo Aquino’s (or his double’s) instrument, my mind goes wondering with initial expectations regarding Adolfo Alix Jr.’s “Porno”  which I would later amend or revise.

Above all, I was here at this Cinemalaya screening exclusive to the Cultural Center of the Philippines to simply enjoy, have fun. 

Alix’s latest film is not a lousy version of Ryu Murakami’s “Tokyo Decadence” (I will resist hyperlinking this, dear readers, in the spirit of self-censorship) nor a loose film adaptation of Irvine Welsh’s sequel to “Trainspotting.” Such judgmental comparison is ridiculous because not all indie films are about shaky cameras, dreadful acting, and senseless nudity.

“Porno” is faithful to its title – the world of pornography, the sex, the decadence, the hidden cameras, and the lives fettered to this milieu.

The life stories here – a porn-film voice actor and pirated DVD vendor (Carlo Aquino), a transgender and Club Mwah performer (Angel Aquino) who pines for her son, and a hitman (Yul Servo) and his moll (Rosanna Roces) – are told in vignettes that do not seem interrelated yet gradually form into a loose-knit yarn.

It wouldn’t take much time for one to discern the connection that binds these stories. Roces’s and Servo’s hilarious sex scene is shot surreptitiously by Carlo Aquino’s brother (Alan Paule), who plans to make another of his straight-to-DVD porn that will be sold on the streets. Whereas Angel Aquino’s story offers hints as to what has become of Carlo Aquino’s character.

Watch the “Porno” trailer here:

Although this film is replete with penetrations, copulations, and assorted “sexformances,” I don’t sense any adherence to the purpose of sexual gratification that is the stuff of good, old-fashioned porn.

It isn’t “Porno’s” intention to arouse or titillate. Instead the film presents us with the bleak countenance of pornography or, simply put, the gritty side of this subcultural industry and its movers and shakers such as the abovementioned characters.

“Porno” shows Alix’s facility with the element of surprise. His earlier films are slow — “Liberacion,” “Aurora” — but this penchant for drawn out real-time becomes most expressive in “Kalayaan.”

“Porno,” on the other hand, has a pulse that gives the film its vibrant pace. Plus the entertaining dialogue and the committed, realistic sex scenes mounted, as it were, by a fine cast. 

Loose narrative

This reviewer has always admired Alix’s courage to take risks, which have reaped its due acclaim. He is the Urian’s Best Director this year for his goth-toned crime drama, “Mater Dolorosa.” 

Alix tells his stories without as much as explaining them at the risk of annotation, and spreads out his narratives which are at best organically loose and incoherent, as all life stories are.

I remember being lost in the narrative of “Aurora,” wondering to myself about scenes in “Kalayaan” that I couldn’t quite grasp, going home with “Tambolita’s” puzzle pieces still scattered in my head.

But Alix respects his audience this way, as if urging them to become one with his stories —a liquid feeling or connection between art work and appreciator that one experiences in the novels of Argentina’s Julio Cortazar, and, in cinema, the works of Godard and Kieslowski.

There are movies that reorient one’s conventional appreciation or, let’s just say, they change the way we watch them.

Life’s varied pulse becomes tied up to the cinema experience, as in “Goodbye, Dragon Inn” and “Cinema Paradiso” – movies about movies and their audiences, whether engrossed in or distracted from the film viewing.  

I wasn’t bothered by the students giggling somewhere at the back row, along with the thinking-aloud questions one heard now and then from the audience. 

“Si Angel Aquino rin kaya yung character ni Carlo Aquino?” (Is Angel Aquino’s character also Carlo Aquino’s?)

“Anong kinalaman nung part nina Yul Servo sa buong story?” (What’s Yul Servo’s story got to do with the whole story?)

“Baka naman yung ‘Aleks’ yung hidden personality nung director, ano?” (Maybe “Alex” is actually the director, ano?)

From these snatches of conversation, you know right away that the cinemas and their audiences are the extended life of a film. I think porn demonstrates that insight more vividly. – Rappler.com

 

RM Topacio-Aplaon is a writer and aspiring novelist. He is also a passionate collector of books.

 

Cinemalaya runs until August 4 at the CCP, TriNoMa, Greenbelt 3, and Alabang Town Center. An Awards Night at the CCP will cap this festival on that date. The screening schedule is available here.