History books define heroes of national prominence as figures of high reverence, depicting them as martyrs who sacrificed for the country, and freedom seekers who wrestled their way toward achieving the nation’s independence at all unimaginable cost.
So much, we could add ‘saint’ before their names, and it wouldn’t feel awfully exaggerated. Jerrold Tarog’s “Heneral Luna,” is an affirmation, the same way the past movies in its category, are, eager to answer the questions that have already been asked and answered for myriad times, before.
But this masterpiece has no intention of just being another version of what has been already told. It aims more, asking bold questions outside the history’s perfectionists’ filter.
By doing so, Tarog sheds light on the big picture, revealing portions that has long been veiled out of sight in the dim shadows, and exposing new facets that might send us to asking new queries that we have never intended to ask, not because we never had the courage to do so, but because history itself is painted with vague colors that we couldn’t even grope for the right questions to throw.
“Heneral Luna” provides new answers before we can even start asking the questions that require them, and it delivers them with profound depth, while also managing to be both informative and, surprisingly, entertaining at the same time.
Aesthetically, “Heneral Luna,” is epic as far as Filipino action-war films go.
Tarog knows his craft, and that extends to his choice in camera shots, being able to perfectly polish his work with breathtakingly sweeping visuals. That same artistry magnifies the intent of his film’s well-structured narrative, and with powerful performances delivered with unmistakable credibility from its actors, “Heneral Luna” screams perfection. That doesn’t mean it is, indeed perfect, but with all the bold choices it has taken, this historical biopic can never be far from epic.
The narrative mostly runs through the course of an impending American occupation, with John Arcilla’s Antonio Luna, taking much of the spotlight. He is depicted as a brilliant war strategist, being able to muster an army of recognizable force even out of meager ordinary citizens. He’s painted with patriotic enthusiasm, but also with unmissable wit, that would often spark brittle laughter among his trusted compatriots. This molds him to a near perfect figure, but Tarog is smart to whisk the picture with flaws, but are only of pure intent to make Luna more human.
Amid the fire that propels him to battle fields, Luna is fragile with irascible pride, embedded to his screaming stern personality. John Arcilla is effective carrying out that Tarog’s vision of Luna, prodigiously depicting the hero with innate insight, and thus, he ultimately emerges as effectively multi-faceted, as the Luna Tarog wants to be. That same insightful Arcilla has, transcends to the rest of the cast, with Mon Confiado, portraying a depraved, less nationalist, Emilio Aguinaldo, coming out as a formidable support.
The immense scale of artfulness presented in this tragic historical biopic, is hard to define by looking at its whole picture, alone. The film makes more sense when its shredding the stark details of its entirety, revealing the less attention-paid flaws of its characters, and its often grim-inspired proceedings, that are always presented with top notch visual artistry.
At its core, “Heneral Luna” exposes greater concerns that stretch far beyond Luna, himself. It doesn’t solely pin the blame for the tragedy that ripped the nation apart, on the fractured character Luna has, but also on the social cancers that has long kept the society rotting long before the invaders landed ashore.
This take sprouts a thoroughly-examined big screen experiment that has, almost, all the makings of a non-conformist cinematic exercise. It’s a deviant form, but one that also pays reverence to what has long been set as true.
This Tarog’s film conforms with the default, but it’s bold expose the vague portions of the picture.
RATING: 9/10 (JE)
