Canon Decampment: Olivia M. Lamasan

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Minsan, Minahal Kita

English Translation: Once, I Loved You
Year of Release: 2000
Director: Olivia M. Lamasan
Screenwriters: Ricky Lee & Olivia M. Lamasan
Producer: Star Cinema Productions

Cast: Sharon Cuneta, Richard Gomez, Edu Manzano, Angel Aquino, Carmina Villaroel, Ciara Sotto, Rosemarie Gil, Sandra Gomez, Marvin Agustin, Kristine Hermosa, Bonggoy Manahan, Ama Quiambao, Andrea del Rosario, Gabe Mercado, Patty Wilson

Diane and Albert are stuck in loveless marriages but after an initial meeting, their paths keep crossing. They fall in love and proceed with a discreet romance. When their affair is discovered, Albert begs Diane to elope with him to the US. Diane is persuaded because her husband, Louie, tends to be physically abusive. But when Albert’s wife Jackie asks for another chance, Diane and Albert’s plans are left in uncertainty.

The team and studio behind Madrasta (Stepmother, 1996), Sharon Cuneta’s breakout as serious actress, devised an even more challenging role for her, this time as the other woman, and were matched with a superior performance, and film, that got taken for granted—possibly in response to a perceived overrating of the earlier project. Cuneta, as well as her director Olivia A. Lamasan, deserve to be remembered more for this type of melodrama entry, one that implicitly critiques her earlier teen-star roles by presenting her as an emotionally and physically battered woman, forced to resort to subterfuge for the sake of love. In Minsan, Minahal Kita, grown-up issues are handled with just the right attention to thematic development and fan-pleasing devices, not to mention an uncompromising stance toward women’s prerogatives in terms of their bodies, desires, and preferences.

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Milan

Additional Languages: Italian, English
Year of Release: 2004
Director: Olivia M. Lamasan
Screenwriters: Moira Lang & Olivia M. Lamasan
From a story by Moira Lang
Producers: ABS-CBN Film Productions & Star Cinema

Cast: Piolo Pascual, Claudine Barretto, Iza Calzado, Ward Luarca, Irma Adlawan, Ilonah Jean, Ryan Eigenmann, Pia Moran, Lotlot de Leon, Cecil Paz, At Maculangan, Lollie Mara, Richard Arellano, Maritess Joaquin, Cathy Garcia-Sampana, Nuel C. Naval, Elvis Vargas, Chona Zaballa, Melogin Evangelista, Matteo Luca, Ernie Cortez, Esting Cortez, Jay Rivera, Longo Francisco, Cristina Cortez, Cesare Cortez, Rochelle Tolentino, Ricardo Lorenzi, Jennifer Arcena, Yulan Tejada, Michael Garland

Wondering why his wife Mary Grace hasn’t been responding to his letters for a long time, Lino decides to leave his job as a factory supervisor and look for her in Milan, Italy. In order to do so, he has to join a group of Filipinos who illegally cross the Swiss border under cover of night. Upon arriving in Milan, he asks Filipino-looking residents if they can remember Mary Grace from a photograph, but no one recognizes her. Jenny, a Filipina who passes herself off as Italian, takes pity on his plight and provides him with bedspace in the apartment she arranged to share with several other migrants, as well as some of the part-time work that she has no difficulty in sourcing, while asking her contacts about the possible whereabouts of Mary Grace. When Lino falls for Jenny’s intelligence and strength of character, she suddenly receives a lead on where Mary Grace might be located.

Of the several OFW-themed rom-coms that Star Cinema produced, Milan distinguishes itself as the most accomplished and heartfelt. The subject of overseas migrant work is by definition nearly inexhaustible, but the budget and resources that the material requires have proved to be obstacles that only the most successful film producer of the millennium can confront, and even then with a full list of commercial compromises. Milan comes close to losing its footing after its midportion, when the central pair begin their preordained process of courtship, coupling, frustration, and reconciliation. The film traverses these treacherous requisites by falling back on the strengths of the traditions it draws from: one is the pre-Code phase of Classical Hollywood, where social and legal violations are acknowledged but treated with nonchalance; the other is the documentalist potential of social realism, realized in the film via on-cam interviews with compatriots who’re apparently living out in real life the specifics of the plot. With such fail-safe measures, the film could actually dispense with cinematic values—but Milan nevertheless provides a tactile, emo-laden captivation of the forlorn enchantments of a long-advanced system running just to stay in place, with performers skilled in their designated tasks and a then-youthful Claudine Barretto uncovering a useful range of performative abilities as she goes along.

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