Doo doo Dubai

to prove his undying love for me, marlon agreed to accompany me to a tagalog movie on a friday night in greenbelt. the movie was dubai, which i, as the decidedly jologs half of this couple, had been hankering to see on account of how much i liked the last “location” pinoy movie (milan, with papa piolo).

i figured dubai had a lot of potential to turn out well, an impression that was fostered by the movie’s opening scene, which had aga driving a pickup truck through miles and miles of sun-baked desert sand dunes with the eraserheads’ “alapaap” playing on his stereo. very nice. (e-heads can make anything work.)

and it indeed seemed to be going very well into the first fifteen minutes or so of the movie. john lloyd, whoi think is rather ugly, actually has a certain “little brother” charm and registers very well onscreen. the supporting cast includes michael de mesa, who can act circles around claudine barrette, the female lead. and of course, aga is a natural.

then somewhere along the way, dubai lost me, and i started noticing things.

uniform

john lloyd and claudine’s characters, at their presumably tender ages, already seem to have reached a dead end in their respective personal styles. john lloyd has a polo-over-t-shirt-with- capri-shorts thing going (every single polo has a big patch on the chest that says “captain”), while claudine’s uniform consists of a stylishly rumpled long-sleeved polo over a tight white tank top and tight capris, with an armful of beaded bracelets.

at first i figured this was de rigeur at the amusement park where she works, but she also wears this ensemble religiously on her days off – of which, for a hardworking ofw, she seems to have an awful lot. she spends them shopping at the arabic tiangge, bellydancing, dating, river cruising, dune buggying, riding camels on the beach/in the desert, and eating gyros.

over the years, i’ve found that there comes a time in every claudine barretto movie when i want to take her by the shoulders and shake her while yelling something. in pare ko, it was “pluck your eyebrows!” in got to believe, it was “you don’t deserve rico!” in kailangan kita, where i believe she launched her new and improved boobage, it was “if you’re going to run around in white peasant blouses all the time, wear a bra!” in milan, it was “you don’t deserve piolo!” here, it was “you’re too young to be stuck in a style rut!”

i also noticed that aga is balding. he has to lose that bagets longish forelock, fast.

moments

for two red-blooded pinoy males, aga and john lloyd are very… mushy. their dialogues are very long, tear-filled and wordy, and they spend the latter half of the movie running around apologizing all over the place. they also say “i love you” a lot. not just i love you, but “mahal na mahal kita.”

i asked marlon, who has two older brothers, if they’ve ever talked to each other in a similar way. he shuddered.

as claudine conveniently disappears from the movie later on, this all becomes quite gay. the inevitable pinoy movie tragic event, habulan sa beach, and swelling gary valenciano theme song are all trotted out for the aga-john lloyd tandem. that their characters are brothers just makes it very, very uncomfortable. there was just this one moment in particular where everyone in the theater got simultaneous, audible heebie-jeebies. (i won’t tell in case you plan to see it.)

sermon

there was a lot of proselytizing about the tribulations and aspirations of the overseas filipino worker. i don’t find this kind of message corny at all. it’s just that a movie has so many opportunities to convey it without getting preachy. this was something milan managed to pull off very well.

in one scene, claudine delves into her reasons for going abroad. “siguro dahil gusto ko lang malayo sa inay ko,” she laments. “o baka gusto ko lang punan ang kalungkutan ko.”

i poked marlon. “is that why you left for singapore?”

he snorted. “oo. gusto ko kasing punan ang kalungkutan ko.”

in another scene, aga hosts a wedding, where he gives a very short toast because he says “hindi naman ako ang kinakasal.” then he picks up the mike and, completely off topic and without provocation, launches into a loooong speech about the ofw’s dignity, hardships, etc etc etc etc. he uses the word “pangarap” at least seven times. or at least it sounds that way, because i kind of zoned out.

i poked marlon again. “if you ever become that preachy about being an ofw, break na tayo.”

tears quivering in his puppy-dog eyes, aga intones, “merong ngang kasabihan. ang pilipino, kahit saang lugar sa mundo mo dalhin ’yan… da best.” he pauses for dramatic effect. “da best ’yan. da best talaga.”

parang hindi ko pa ata naririnig ang kasabihang yan.