THE
INTRODUCTION OF Affordable digital video cameras and the prospect of
making films inexpensively and independent of big studio have stirred
up a lot of excitement in the Philippine film community. Whereas
traditional filmmaking requires huge investments in film stock alone,
digital movie making—which accounts for 40 percent of last years local
production—is possible for a fraction of the usual production budget.
Therefore many Filipino filmmakers have, by themselves or with the
support of the recent Cinemalaya festival or the upcoming CinemaOne
competition, started making movies without relying on the resources of
mainstream production companies. Some of their output, “Ang Pagdadalaga
ni Maximo Oliveros,” in particular, have reaped critical acclaim here
and abroad. Now, digital movies are seen as a way out of the
local film industry’s usual fare of often formulaic productions. Many
filmmakers, critics and fans anticipate a third “Golden Age” of
Philippine cinema, with directors taking on new and untried subject
matters that big studios would rather not touch. They hope that fresh
narrative strategies and innovative ways of storytelling will breathe
new life into the industry, which is currently in dire straits because
of the dominance of American blockbusters and the curse of DVD piracy. I
am about to play the spoilsport here, or the devil’s advocate. I will
argue that digital movie making is not magic pixie dust, and might
actually be bad for Philippine cinema. In contrast to the current
euphoria over digital movies, I will point out some of their
shortcomings. I understand perfectly well how important it is for
Filipino filmmakers to find a cheaper way to make movies. And I was
impressed by the variety and quality of the last batch of Cinemalaya
entries. Nevertheless, I’d like to offer a dissenting opinion that I
hope would be taken as constructive criticism. Here, David-Letterman-style, are 10 Reasons Why Digital Filmmaking Is Bad For Philippine Cinema: 10) Digital just don’t look as good as 35-millimeter. Despite arguments to the contrary, that’s just how it is, period. 9) Digital makes it too easy. The
fact that traditional film is an expensive medium has made many
directors adhere to strict budgets. A lot of good and ever-popular
films have been made with little money. Consider “The Bicycle Thief” or
“Rashomon,” “Psycho” or “Chungking Express.” Manuel Conde´s “Gengis
Khan” is also a great example—a local film with a low budget, but high
impact on the viewer to this very day, simply because Conde
consistently knew where to position his camera. At present, many film
industries in the region, including South Korea, thrive precisely on
this economy of means. Many local digital movies show a dangerous
lack of restraint that makes them dull and dragging. Many of the
familiar weaknesses of Philippine films are made worse in digital
movies: the director often relies too much on dialogue to tell the
story, instead of focusing on the visual aspects of film. These films
also make way for cheesy melodrama—actresses who look like models sob
uncontrollably; sweaty men in undershirts shout hysterically; there are
endless, tearful discussions and shouting matches; phoney tragedy and
kitchen-sink drama rule. 8) Digital encourages sloppiness. Movies
such as the otherwise exciting “Rotonda” delight in constant violations
of the line of action and other basic rules of filmmaking. This
happened so often, that it was pointed out by veteran director Marilou
Diaz-Abaya during the last Cinemalaya conference. While I do not mind
violations of the rules taught in film school, I’d like to see good
reasons when filmmakers ignore them. Yet, in many of the newer digital
movies, the camera moves all over the place instead of being positioned
in such a way that the viewer easily understands spatial relations in a
given scene. 7) Digital breeds its own mannerisms. Since
digital cameras are usually small and easy to carry, many digital
cinematographers have chosen to shoot in a quirky, rickety fashion. The
handheld camera is the all the rage, allowing for shaky shots and
super-quick pans and tilts, which are then linked together by jump
cuts. While there is nothing essentially wrong with that, it has become
a mannerism that gives many of these movies a uniform look. Filmmakers
who use such techniques should be reminded that a lot of the Nouvelle
Vague and Direct Cinema films from the ’60s, which were shot with 16-mm
cameras, employed similar methods. Today, they all look contrived. On
the other end of the spectrum of digital mannerisms are endless,
self-indulgent long takes or wallowing tracking shots. While I like a
good long take or elegant tracking shot, the picture quality of most
digital movies simply does not allow for that (yet). Digital video
images are intrinsically flat. They do not provide the depth of field
of the old panchromatic film stock that made the long takes in the
works of Orson Welles or Jean Renoir so breathtaking. This may change
soon however. 6) Digital could lower the audience’s audio-visual standards. Most
Filipinos are exposed to terrible audio-visual environment. I am not
talking about the artistic value of movies, televisions shows etc, but
about their visual quality. Many cinemas have second-rate projectors
and insufficient sound systems, because the audience is undemanding.
Reception for terrestrial television stations and cable channels is
frequently bad. The picture quality of many VCDs, still the most
popular medium for movies, is often worse than that of old VHS tapes.
And the pirated DVDs, the primary source of movie entertainment for
many Filipinos, are often faulty. Some of them are even filmed directly
off a cinema screen, so the picture is blurry and the sound
incomprehensible. Thus, the Filipino viewers have grown dangerously
tolerant of low quality. Digital movies, whose images at times dissolve
into large chunks of pixels during screening, could encourage this
tolerance. 5) Digital will stigmatize local films. If
majority of local films were to be produced digitally, as some hope, it
might add to the public perception that local films are generally
cheap: “Di bale na, Filipino film lang naman ´yan.” I hear this ever so
often. It certainly doesn’t help in the competition with the
100-Million-Dollar movies from Hollywood that are currently congesting
most of the mall cinemas. 4) Digital could make Philippine movies less competitive internationally. “Maximo
Oliveros” was a success in international festivals despite being shot
on digital video. The film’s visual style fit its gritty tale. Other
films do not necessarily benefit from the “digital look.” I am sure
international film festivals would pick up the Cinemalaya entry,
“Batad.” By virtue of its story line, I can even imagine it in European
art house cinemas—if it had not been filmed with digital video, which
seriously spoiled some of the beautiful shots of the rice terraces and
the Cordilleras. 3) Digital will make everybody an intern. Popular
actors, such as Eddie Garcia and Boots Anson-Roa, have worked for
little or no pay in recent low-budget independent films. So have many
other movie people—from set designers to boom operators. They continue
to do so, and this is laudable. Many could be hoping to be elevated to
work on regular film productions by accepting an honorarium, like an
intern, for the mean time. However, once the major studios and TV
stations see how inexpensively they can hire ambitious personnel, they
may try to take advantage. Instead of coming up with innovative film
ideas for themselves, they might just get independent filmmakers and
their crews to work on their own low-budget productions, for lower fees. 2) Digital in the Philippines may come to mean art house cinema—without art house cinemas. A
lot of filmmakers in the Philippines right now are eager to produce
films that are out of the ordinary. There could be an audience for
those, but we may never know because, unlike in Europe, there is no art
house cinema circuit in this country that will play them on a regular
basis. The only venues for these movies are schools and universities
that hold occasional screenings, or such festivals as Cinemalaya and
CinemaOne. These festivals—which, indeed, do a magnificent job
sponsoring new productions—should be careful not to breed a new species
of filmmakers who produce exclusively for festivals, as some European
auteur filmmakers do. New methods of distribution on DVD or via the
Internet might provide alternatives to the traditional theatrical
release. The series of CinemaOne films from last year, recently issued
on VCD, is an interesting experiment in digital film distribution. 1) And finally: Digital cannot adequately depict the Philippine night I
don’t know any other national cinema where night scenes are given such
importance as in Philippine cinema. Apart from the American film noir,
Philippine movies must be among the darkest in the world. Consider the
frequent reference to the pa-siyam (novena) lit by candles, or the
attack of the aswang under a full moon, a gripping chase scene in the
dark back alleys of Manila, or the lovemaking in a pigsty in “Himala.”
In Philippine cinema the night is often among the principal characters.
It can be haunting, as in Mike De Leon´s “Itim,” or full of pitch-black
despair as in Lino Brocka´s “Maynila, Sa Kuko ng Liwanag.” It might
ooze with sensuality as in Ishmael Bernal´s “Manila by Night” or serve
as the appropriately gloomy backdrop as in Chat Gallardo´s “Geron
Busabos.” In no other area does digital cinema look as poor as in
such night scenes, and there seems to be little improvement in this
area, thus depriving Philippine cinema of one of its most important
characteristics. Dr. Tilman Baumgärtel is a media critic from Germany, who currently teaches at the UP Film Institute. | 
