Maryo J. de los Reyes'
Jewel
Tagos Ng Dugo (1987)
First of all, serial murder is almost alien to Philippine crime journalism, a fact that's due certainly to our police force's lack of records on such cases. Now, this police-records gap may of course in turn reflect a lack of local police coordination towards (or, worse, capability for) determining crime patterns as possibly serial. Unless those determinations have to do with the usual cop-out that goes like this: "it's another NPA hit" blah blah blah, or "it's another murder similar to the one that happened last week, and this is reflective of pornography's . . .". My above statements are meant to illustrate a national wont to demean our own police organization's capability (or, worse, intelligence) that may neither be fair nor productive, but it would be a habit that certainly is not undeserved given the record -- official and memorial -- of the police's prioritizing its own people's interests and "rackets".
Given this background, therefore, Tagos Ng Dugo can be said to be a demonstration of serial crimes' possible placement in local shores, and that would certainly be a valid view. Except, of course, that in effect Tagos is also -- and probably should be read primarily as -- a demonstration of possibilities other than the merely forensic. I say "should be," since the police is portrayed fairly in the film, albeit not exactly generously.
So what could be all the fuss about Tagos' value? "Production values" is the often-heard reason, needing elucidation. A breakthrough for Philippine psychological movies? Probably.
Let me explore a few other angles on this seeming cross between Francois Truffaut's The Bride Wore Black and Luis Buñuel's Belle du Jour -- I don't know if screenwriter Jake Tordesillas or De los Reyes himself should be congratulated for the cohesion of multi-resultants in this work. Part of this multi-readings would be the movie as a feminist take on womankind's monthly pains as a form of excuse for female monthly insanities, insanities our machos regard as regular terrorism on the whole of mankind (men or society as a whole). It is with that reading that the ending apologies, by Vilma Santos in the lead role, might be understood as a plea for understanding of how all of woman's monthly Eve-behavior should not be seen as a Biblical sin but as an equal (to, say, men's beastly) naturalness. . . . Another feminist reading, more radical perhaps, would treat the film as a view of how Philippine society (the men in it, primarily) approaches provincial innocence, educational weakness, and "females' weaker sanity" as stimuli for abuse. . . . There is, however, the possibly more general reading of the film as an apologia for insanity qua itself, how it should be treated as a disease instead of as a monster to be eliminated. . . . And finally, there's the possibility that the film is actually a depiction of how crazy the world outside the insane mind really is, albeit this view would probably be the least successful direction for the film. . . . As a bonus, maybe we can also bring the movie to more latent, more philosophical territory, say, how it depicts the sanity of innocence.
But, given the validity and possible weight of all those approaches, what finally makes this movie a jewel in Philippine cinema history is how it brings forth -- every time you watch it -- its case achievements in directorial and film editing dramaturgy (including the recurring stage-like choreography, Hitchcockish camera positionings, and acting pacing within). For the serious student of third-world filmmaking, here is a requisite Philippine movie from where to cull precious fragments. In these fragments, he/she is sure to find sparkles that are in themselves gems. (VISV III, July 2002 - April 2004)
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