PLONING

I have to admit, I am no lover of the current crop of Pinoy films being produced by commercial filmakers. The last commercially-produced film I have watched was Kris Aquino's "Happy Together" and was not entirely "happy" about it.

Perhaps as a reaction to the dullness and un-inventiveness of commercial film producers, the past few years have seen emergence of a new breed of surprisingly quite good independent filmakers. Is it a sign that Filipino movies are going to a different direction and that finally, these film makers are actually realizing Pinoys need better and "meatier" films to watch? Or is it a slow, but steadily building, reaction of a creative community that realized, "Hey, we're getting sick and tired of these producers making formula movies using copied and hacked Hollywood scripts."

Whatever reason it is, I am happy (not in a Kris Aquino happy way) that I do get to watch these excellent indie movies when I have the chance to.

And speaking of indie movies, which is really the whole point of this entry, I chanced upon an online promotion of this new movie that'll be shown at the end of this month. It's called PLONING (click here). From what I have seen on their site and the trailer, it seems to be a good movie. It stars Judy Ann Santos who, incidentally, is also one of the producers.

At first, I laughed at the name. To a Tagalog's ear, the name is as queer as Tekla, Kurdapya or Pokwang. Then I googled more. Turns out it's a lovely Palawan ditty. (I take back what I said. The name now has a pleasant ring to it.)

I googled further and found this lovely trailer for the movie.



Sigh, with this summer heat, how I wish I am in Cuyo right now and humming the tune of Ploning.