FILMMAKER'S NOTE: HOSPITAL BOAT (2009)

Peace Greetings!

While I am inviting you to watch my film Hospital Boat, allow me to share some thoughts how this project came into being.

In the month of April 2009, I started shooting the film Hospital Boat (HB) in the island of Samal and some parts of Davao City, thus, weaving a story about love and friendship in the midst of war in the impoverished island of Sulu. 

My script for HB had been stored in my files for eight years already! This is because narrative filmmaking during those times is remote and a costly project for dreamers like me. But in the advent of technology, film production is democratized and “indie filmmaking” took off here in our poor country. A single handy unit of camera like XLI and XL2 are now capable of documenting and filming with the least cost covered. That's why, Hospital Boat is predestined to sail as a Mindanaon story based from the narratives of Mindanoan peoples and the lens of a Mindanaoan storyteller.

Davao City is slowly making headway in building a fledgling but promising independent film industry in the locality. I organized the SkyWeaver Productions with the end view of specializing the creation of full length/feature films with stories promoting tolerance and multiculturalism--themes innate to Mindanao. This will only be realized through collaborating with kindred spirits like HYDEout Entertainment and Alchemy of Vision and Light Productions in the case of my second film. In two years time, SkyWeaver Productions already made two full length films. SkyWeaver is also bent in encouraging and developing Mindanaoan film writers and directors in the locality.

It's also interesting to note the emergence of the local producers who have shown passion in indie film by investing in actual production. They have decided to journey with me in this road less traveled by. They are the pillars why an indie film like Hospital Boat has come into being. They are the lifeblood of this film project.

The social perspective of an independent local film industry in Mindanao, as I would say, must always be in the effort to provide entertainment and education to the nation. To be distinct, a Mindanaoan film must be a tool in preserving a progressive culture that nurtures diversity, and promoting a perspective of non-violence and tolerance.

A truly Mindanaoan film must contribute in the dawning of a new but progressive indie film industry which is once beholden to Manila. Mindanaoan indie films must serve to counter mainstream movies using either worn out or rehashed storylines. Indie films in general are more popular and liberating since it tackles themes that are out of the box. Indie filmmakers are empowered since they are not beholden to any shrewd producers who have long molded our minds with sex and violence.

I am labeled as a maker of advocacy films. With this, I discuss multi-layered issues on how Mindanao suffer in poverty and landlessness. Villains in my stories are the despots that cling to power and inflict violence to poor lumad-moro and christian settlers. But there is always hope in my films because I always made it to a point that my protagonists are my peace champions and they always live to tell the message of hope. For a Mindanaoan fimmaker, it is a pleasure to see on screen unknown actors but who are highly capable thespians who nurtured their crafts as theatre actors and hearing different languages spoken by them is both a challenge and a treat. 

Are Mindanaoans a ready market for indie films? I can't answer this. But my experience in my previous film Hunghong sa Yuta taught us. Thousands of students not only in Mindanao but also in Cebu and Manila have watched it. So there is indeed a gleam of hope here when it comes to film audience development. Prodding must continue. I am committed to offer a new kind of film every year. And there are other Mindanaoan young filmmakers who trudge towards the same path. 

For Mindanao filmmaking to survive, an industry must be built. Mindanao is endowed with abundant talents, it is also gifted with kind hearted individuals who are willing to shell out their own money to produce films, and we can not make it with out you as our audience and patrons. We can make more films that are meaningful to Mindanaoans and to the nation. Patronize Mindanaoan films and we will bring more. There are many stories in Mindanao that need to be told.

Please enjoy watching my film. Lastly, I want to read and hear your comments about my film “Hospital Boat”. Please email your comments and inquiries at skyweaver09@yahoo.com.

Sail on to our dreams, for peace and progress in Mindanao may reign soon. 

Sincerely yours,

Arnel M. Mardoquio 

Filmmaker, Hospital Boat

SkyWeaver Productions 

*****

HYDEout Entertainment

Skyweaver Productions

Alchemy of Vision and Light Film and TV Productions

in coordination with the

National Commission for Culture and Arts (NCCA) 

present:

HOSPITAL BOAT

a Mindanaoan film by: Arnel M. Mardoquio

Synopsis:

     Orphaned by war, 12-year old Nikol found a new home in Isla Kalilintad, an island community of people from different cultures and faith traditions. He was forced to become an adult at a tender age, trying to eke out a living to feed Langit, his younger brother. By serendipitous circumstance, Dr Sittie and Sr Claire, a team of humanitarian workers on a mobile medical mission, visited the isla before they proceed to the other smaller islands. Nikol, eager to grab the chance to work, presented himself as a natural healer and got accepted as an all around utility person for the mission. The mobile medical mission which runs on a low budget, relies on fishing boats offered by the communities they serve as they make their way to far-flung villages rarely reached by medical services from both government and private sector. Each journey to these unknown frontiers bears stories of struggle and survival of people affected by war and extreme poverty.

     Sittie, a medical doctor, decided to return home to her father’s village in Isla Kalilintad to serve as a community doctor. Sr Claire, being a nurse herself, volunteered to be part of the team as her vocation and mission duty.

     In one of their mission routes, Nikol met Lensha, a thirteen year-old lass who was in deep trauma due to rape and war. Nikol got smitten with her at that instance. Lensha stayed with the medical team as a form of therapy and as the days go by, these youngsters grew fond of each other.

     Nikol, Sittie, Claire, Lensha and the rest of the islanders converge in different settings as the story unfolds. Amid the social landscape of poverty, warlordism and unending cycles of violence—the humanitarian mission continue to brave the waters, putting at risk even their own lives for the greater good.

      Hospital Boat symbolically depicts a journey. A journey to the road less taken by few courageous souls; a journey filled with love, friendship and a dream of a peaceful tomorrow.

***

THAT GANG OF THREE IN CINEMALAYA: A MANIFESTO

Arnel Mardoquio

     The recent dispute  in Cinemalaya with indie filmmaker director Emerson Reyes prod  me  to take a closer  look in the goings of the country's so-called ‘leading festival’ and,  I see pus in the old wound, a gangrened system much worse now when I saw and left them two years ago.  While Emerson Reyes reached his saturation point, his act finally unmasked the faces of the people behind the besmirched reputation of Cinemalaya. Cinemalaya is controlled by the Gang of Three, Laurice Guillen, Roby Tan and Nestor Jardin. They are hiding inside the noblest vision of independent filmmaking but in reality they are out to subvert the artistic freedom of an indie film director.  They have always proclaimed this act as legitimate.


     Filmmakers are always at their mercy.  The money which they do not own becomes their bargaining power to be able to inject their old style and dictatorial leadership under the guise of safeguarding the trust endowed to them by Cinemalaya Foundation.   Over the years they love to pose as matrons yet morphing as the symbols of tyranny in the arena of independent filmmaking in the country today.


     Two years ago, I was in the final list of entries in the 6th Edition of Cinemalaya and I was almost a victim of the resolute acts of the gang-of-three had I not vehemently refused and rejected their manipulations. Their acts were all documented as I have mademy protests in writing to the committee, but of course, nothing came for me except for the sweet moment when I decided to pull out my entry “SHEIKA”. Just like what happened to Emerson, my ordeal with this gang of three was very much identical in broad strokes.


     The specific highlights in my dispute with Cinemalaya: First, after I signed the contract with them, Mr. Roby Tan approached and told me not to shoot so that they could have a say on my film. If I won’t take heed, my first tranche will never be released.  Right from the beginning they made it clear that they wanted a female lead star from the mainstream cinema to play the lead role in my film. Second, weeks past I got a call from the monitoring team that I could not start shooting my film since I did not follow their directive to cast the female lead star of their choice.  In that phone conversation with the monitoring team, a daughter of Roby Tan said to me: “Hindi papasukin ng media para panoorin ang film mo kasi hindi kilala ang mga artista mo. Dapat nag hire ka ng tunay na artista, hindi pwede yang Indie-indie mo” ( Media persons will not watch your film because  your cast are not popular. You should have hired a real mainstream artist. Your indie style will not work.)


     In all their efforts to meddle in my freedom, I have told the screening committee that they should watch their actuations: they have acted as if they were the producers of my film when they have only shelled out five hundred thousand pesos.  Their style became studio-like and they started to act like dictators, bringing the old decadent system and attitude in the industry where they had come from. Plainly, they would remind me that Cinemalaya is one of the rarest venues where I could be launched as a director. But, I forget their sweet promises and bid them farewell. They had all the means to wrestle with the truth to the point of accusing me that my film has already been made prior to the final selection round and that they disqualified me for this. I was never disqualified. I pulled out Sheika from their rooster. 


     So, my award in Netpac-Cinemalaya and my winnings in Urian in 2011 for the same film I have disputed with the gang of three, especially for the best actress award were just great vindications on my part.  Fe GingGing Hyde eventually became Urian's Best Actress, the unknown actress from the region of Mindanao. Shame on them!



     To further boost the morale of director Emerson Reyes, he should look at Cinemalaya the way I consoled myself. It is a private enterprise. It is not a foundation in the real sense. The foundation was just made to cap the taxes of Mr. Tony Boy Cojuanco. That gang-of-three made Cinemalaya a pig pen. This is the only festival in the country that family members of their own can be involved in competitions, where their relatives are field strategically in the process of filmmaking, their closest kin could easily bag the best supporting actress award for several times, filmmakers in the main competition do not have the freedom to subtitle their films since the contract of subtitling has already been awarded to the company owned by the Festival Director, a member of the screening committee can jump the board and become the producer of the finalist entry.  The worst part of it, last year's opening film of Cinemalaya came from the member of the gang-of-three. It's all in the family and finally, Roby Tan’s Seiko “Ang Wallet Na Maswerte” is back through the backdoor of CCP.  What a mess inside the Cinemalaya pig pen.  What a shame!

     Since Cinemalaya is a private enterprise, then they can always do whatever they want.  The festival is a three-in-one for them: Income and prestige and junkets abroad.

     Why join in the fracas inside the pig pen just for the so called prestige and honor or the chance for your film to be programmed abroad? Now that Emerson Reyes is already out of Cinemalaya, I offer a toast to him. Cheers! He is finally out from the clutches of tyranny.  The effect of this recent dispute is far from over.  While some recall for reform within Cinemalaya to boot out the gang-of-three, I support them all the way. In my own small ways that I could give, I am launching a very local advocacy campaign to boycott any film from Cinemalaya entering the regions of Mindanao.

     As Teng Mangansakan told me last week, this is a call to boycott Cojuanco products and services. We can do this. Why not?  


Boycott Cinemalaya in Mindanaw!


(SGD)

Arnel Mardoquio
Regional Filmmaker

So, my award in Netpac-Cinemalaya and my winnings in Urian in 2011 for the same film I have disputed with the gang of three, especially for the best actress award were just great vindications on my part.  Fe GingGing Hyde eventually became Urian's Best Actress, the unknown actress from the region of Mindanao. Shame on them!

Best Screenplay: Arnel Mardoquio

Best Actress: Fe GingGing Hyde

Best Editing: Willie Apa Jr and Arthur Ian Garcia

Sheika won Best Picture at the 6th Cinemalaya Film Fest- NETPAC Category

(pep.ph)

***