Matteo Guidicelli will play iconic Filipino superhero Pedro Penduko in an upcoming movie. To be directed by John Paul Laxamana, the formal announcement was made at the Viva offices on the 22nd of October.
Matteo said he felt honored and very excited to play Pedro Penduko who was previously brought to life by actors Efren Reyes Sr, Ramon Zamora, and Janno Gibbs in the movies and by Matt Evans on television.
“We’ve been eager, excited to start with Pedro Penduko,” Matteo said.
The actor has been training for almost two months for this upcoming film.
“With direk Sonny [Sison], we’ve been training for two months now, yung mga fight scenes namin, physical conditioning.”
According to Matteo, Director Sonny who choreographed fight scenes for the movies Maria and Buybust had given him tips based on his training.
The movie has a lot of cultural references, especially on Philippine martial arts traditions according to Matteo.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oa99hLCtQfM
“A lot of cultural references especially with the Philippine martial arts tradition. They do a lot of stick fighting Visayan style. Also, as you can see, Pedro Penduko has tattoos on his chest.
“I think we’ll be featuring also yung mga lumang style of tattoos, yung talagang (old style tattoos, that’s really) solid Filipino-Visayan tattoos also. So it will be all about the culture and tradition,” Matteo said.
Director of The Third Party, 100 Tula Para kay Stella, and Between Maybes Jason has also revealed some parts of the story where Pedro Penduko will go to an alternate world, which will feature the ancient Visayas era.
“May part ng story na Pedro will go to another world. That another world is like para siyang ancient Visayas.
“So all the characters there they’ll wear about 15th, 16th century Visayan clothes, ornaments, and yung leader nila doon isang datu, they all have these baybaylans. Meron din tayong setting na Land of the Spirits according to Cebuano… mas Visayan.
“I want them to appear as we visited the Visayan old times.”
In the interview, Matteo was asked who would be playing Maria Makiling since there were rumors his real-life girlfriend Sarah Geronimo might be tapped for the role. Matteo immediately said that it’s up to the bosses as to who would be playing the folk lore legend.
Direk Jason, however, confirmed that, “Mag ca-cameo si Sarah Geronimo.”
Will she in the movie as Maria Makiling?
Direk Jason answered, “Ano in this chapter, wala si Maria so wala pa, so wala in this chapter.”
