BAMBOO FLOWERS

 BAMBOO FLOWERS

 by: Andrea Navarro

            Sineng Pambansa or National Cinema is the FDCP’s flagship program, whose task is to revitalize the Filipino film industries by supporting the production of high quality films. There are so many entries for these years Sineng Pambansa but I get to watch only one film and that is Bamboo Flowers. Directed by a film and television director, Maryo J. Delos Reyes. My expectation was there maybe because I was so amazed to the previous Cinemalaya 2013 that has captured my heart and my wanting to watch more indie films. Bamboo flowers was a beautiful film yet a so light compared to others. 

            Different characters with different struggles was shown there is the tour guide Berta (Irma Adlawan) who’s having a difficulty raising her family most especially her father’s medicine, With that, she’s forced to let her son Omel (Ruru Madrid) move to the city to take a job at an electronics store. Luis (Orlando Sol) is studying to be a seaman but can’t seem to pass his exams for six years. While his girlfriend Dolores (Max Collins) is working as an intern at a resort, and dreaming to go to abroad as well. Sandra (Mylene Dizon) had a painful event back in Manila, returns to her homeland Bohol with her spoiled son Eric.

            There will always be crying in cinema, for the viewers to connect with the film. But bamboo flowers exceeded the need of crying for it seems to do nothing but have characters cry. As a film, it feels overstuffed and melodramatic. It piles on one crying scene after another, the characters so prone to high emotion that it loses all of its effect. The good thing is that even though the characters have different struggles, at the end they manage to be happy and contented. Omel was given the opportunity to compete in a contest that changes the lives of his family. Luis and Dolores even though they decided to end their relationship at the end, they were still together living a simple life. Sandra and his son after a painful event from the past, they choose to moved on and start over again. 

 

At first, I was confused whether their stories were connected. But the connection between them is only incidental anyway. What I like the most between the three stories is the young lovers Luis and Dolores because both of them promise their love to each other even if it means living a simple life. Overall, It was a nice film but it didn’t reach my expectation anyway. It was so light compared to the previous Cinemalaya but I will never forget this film, not because of the story itself but my experience watching the film :) me and my friend watched the film in the last full show and you know what happened? It turns to be a horror cinema! We were only four  watching the film, imagine that -.-