VOX POPULI (Dennis Marasigan, 2010)

Vox populi, vox dei.

The voice of people, the voice of God. In Dennis Marasigan’s frank but comic political satire Vox Populi, these ancient words are turned on their head and undergo the worst ironies and corruptions we in modern times are not exactly unfamiliar with and not exactly unaffected by. For all intents and purposes, we have rendered passé the spirit of this Latin saying, made extinct as Latin itself. For politics, Philippines-style, implicates and indicts us, who take on the term political animal with savage literalism. Our brand of politics, to amplify the metaphor, is a disgustingly tentacular beast that corrupts and depraves everything it touches.

In Vox Populi, the vantage point is recomposed and refreshed yet again – through the eyes of a blank-slate character straight out of a Frank Capra political comedy. Connie de Gracia, a first-time candidate in mayoralty elections in a town called San Cristobal, displays an unsophisticated, all-but-naive manner, with still youthful features that belie a past she terms disgraced. It’s a wise and ingenious character makeup, the tabula rasa, the innocent eye that might as well be that of a child. And it is just as well: Electoral candidates have a way of devolving into self-conscious and docile creatures who lose their ability to judge themselves and their public acts correctly

Everything happens on the last day of the campaign – the meat of this film and the subject of hand-held cameras following Connie de Gracia’s every move – packed as it is with gross incident and shockingly frank exposition that reveal the putrefying cross-section of Filipino politics. Around Connie de Gracia are a retinue of supporters who seem more naturally pragmatic and more politically wise than she could ever be: Tony, the political strategist who does most of the dirty work performing electoral sleights of hand behind her back; Ricky, Connie’s younger brother, who will use traditional electioneering tactics and personal charms to sway wide swaths of voters like religious groups and friendly block-voters, and Letty, her personal assistant who simultaneously feeds her voter psychology and sandwiches for missed meals.

Even in these all-too-cynical times, there remains a lightly off-putting power about the campaign transactions that go down in Vox Populi. They proceed shamelessly with the same audacity of commercial barter and bargain. Barefacedly, potential voters make known their problems that need to be resolved in a strict, reciprocal transaction of quid pro quo. Even Connie de Gracia without fully realizing it is already being sucked into this vortex of corruption. Asking about the technicalities of the electoral rules, she makes sure that her every campaign move is legal, although it may involve something so immoral and unethical as the subtle disenfranchisement of her opponents’ voters.

Essentially, Vox Populi goes over familiar but factual terrain, but Marasigan is an adept operator negotiating his material with controlled satire and refuses to milk his situations for easy laughs. When the moments do come, they are well-earned and authentically funny. The diverse and motley characters that Connie de Gracia encounters on the last day of the campaign are just as familiar: her brother’s grizzled godfather who only wants her to acknowledge all of her past – both their shameful parts and the reflected glories of her politician father – before he pledges his support; the pastor who has control of a block-voting religious group; an old professor of Connie’s who tests the true idealism and mettle of his old student; and a business tycoon who hedges his bets by supporting all the candidates with the agency of money. Marasigan weaves all these characters and their contexts with assured and masterful insight and confidence. A gifted farceur in this instance, Marasigan could have been a vulgar humorist if he didn’t exercise tranquil restraint. The laughs could have come fast and cheaply, but fortunately that isn’t so. He measures and weighs all his effects and the result is a potent film that doesn’t last one second more than it needs to.

Vox Populi is a refreshing satire with an old soul. We may know in advance the social types and social ills the film acidly presents to us but we shake our heads with as much outrage as the first time to its corrupt and savage truths. After all, these compromised and concessional truths define for us the hulking juggernaut known as the Filipino realpolitik. Redemption comes for the much-aggrieved audience at a crucial moment in the film when a group of youths approach candidate Connie – to pledge their support. Her strategists ask automatically, In return for what? The answer is a gentle reproach – or perhaps a stinging rebuke – of youthful idealism, a moment of exclamatory significance for a crowd awaiting sweet deliverance.

ANATOMIYA NG KORUPSIYON (Dennis Marasigan, 2011)

Expectations run high when a film like this attempts a portrait of such a monolithic subject as corruption. Anatomiya ng Korupsyon seems dressed for the part, as portentously titled as any picture put on screen, conjuring in our minds something epic and dramatic. Director Dennis Marasigan, however, has a reputation for making films of finesse and tempered sentiment, and sadly enough, in this film, he sticks too conservatively to his comfort zone.

As much as a public pillory is in order -- that carcass of corruption dragged out into the open -- Marasigan softpedals it. The subject he singles out -- shenanigans in a Marcos-era government office -- is handled all but daintily. Euphemistically. Marasigan seems too much of a nice guy to fight fire with fire. He all but says, excuse me, before he skewers his quarry. 

In Anatomiya ng Korupsyon, Marasigan hides more than he shows -- often to our dismay. Perhaps we are expecting an expose, while Marasigan presumes his subject to be a fait accompli. For instance, he gives us a scene where a government clerk with a deck of playing cards proposes a game to an officemate, but Marasigan just as soon cuts away. It is an opportunity fraught with possibilities that goes begging. We get it, but Marasigan approaches it with control and restraint, and consummates what the scene is about off screen. 

Restraint, obviously, is not bad in itself. And there are those who like Anatomiya the way it is. But sometimes this film doesn't need it. Sometimes it needs to loosen its reins for fear of asphyxiation. Following through on its potentially humorous moments will only improve the synergy of its parts.

Few filmmakers like Bresson (L'Argent) can pull off what Marasigan is trying to do, a tight-lipped treatment of a massive theme like corruption. As it is, Marasigan is doing Frank Capra material with Bressonian seriousness and deadpan. Here, its main protagonist, Cely Martinez, a new, idealistic lawyer appointed to the Family Court, is the picture of deadpan, to the point of making her seem more soulless than the lively corrupt government officials that surround her. (It might be argued that that is precisely the point: Corruption has been naturalized.) 

That is the kind of ambiguity and uncertainty marring this film. When dealing with its humorous moments, it also gets bogged down by its oscillation between parody and satire. Parody, for instance, is a shot of an office drawer stocked full of merchandize like cigarettes and candy. We don’t laugh. It’s old and there is no riff on it.  

Satire, on the other hand, is what happens when a corrupt clerk actively hides a folder of documents on a disordered desk in order to delay their delivery and therefore cause more bureaucratic grease money. Now this image is fresh and we react accordingly. In terms of parody, Anatomiya does not present anything new, nor does it reinvent its images. With its satire, the film scores points by ridiculing, for instance, the actions of the misguided clerk. Why satire is not sustained all along, one can only suspect that the material has not been thoroughly developed. 

Ambiguity also attends the depiction of corrupt superiors in Anatomiya. They do not come across as villains. They are almost too clean and mild-mannered. They don’t wallow in luxury and money. They are almost understanding, nice guys, giving the newcomer all the leeway she needs. Perhaps it is all intended to depict a new kind of culpability, but their lot looks more naturally life-like than the film’s supposed heroine. 

If I'm somewhat disappointed with Anatomiya ng Korupsyon, it is because the film is not half bad. Marasigan is a well-meaning filmmaker who has proven himself in this vein before, but this time, he has in his hands a work in progress. Perhaps he ought to look at his film’s ending first. Out of nowhere, it equates an idealistic and incorruptible character like Cely Martinez with someone like Jun Lozada, someone who is not exactly beyond reproach. While the likes of Cely Martinez eat insipid cafeteria food under a mocking poster of La Dolce Vita, the likes of Lozada are luxuriating in a club house in some exclusive subdivision. And what of the staggeringly cynical line that Anatomiya takes from Lozada – how he was tasked to "moderate the greed” of public officials – are there gradations of greed then? Is corruption, and the guilt born out of it, a matter of negotiation now?   

Alternate Title: Anatomiya ng Korupsyon

Title in English: Anatomy of Corruption