Canon Decampment: Antoinette Jadaone

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That Thing Called Tadhana

English Translation: That Thing Called Meant-to-Be
Additional Languages: English, Ilocano
Year of Release: 2014
Director & Screenwriter: Antoinette Jadaone
Producers: Cinema One Originals, Epicmedia, Monoxide Works, One Dash Zero Cinetools

Cast: Angelica Panganiban, JM de Guzman, Joem Bascon, Carlos Castano, Joenel Canaria, Bianca Balbuena, JR Miano, Joi Bayan, Kelvin Dy, Martin Mayuga, Jane Torres, Marjarey Kasey Politico, Monique Ladimo

At the airport on his way home from overseas work in Rome, Anthony Lagdameo sees Mace Castillo unable to check in her luggage because of excess weight. He offers to carry some of her possessions since he will be traveling light. Mace is affected by tearjerker scenes in the movie that she watches, and confesses that her boyfriend had dumped her for another woman. Anthony opts to keep her company to help nurse her broken heart, even when she expresses a drunken wish to take a trip all the way north to Baguio. They discover along the way that Mace’s dream was to write short fiction, while Anthony’s was to be a book illustrator. Their further interactions reveal a mutual compatibility with each other, but the results of such a quick-blooming romance will sometimes be unpredictable for both of them.

The several crossovers from independent to mainstream film practice generally failed to find sustainable exemplars. That Thing Called Tadhana has been the most influential of the lot, and the reasons are immediately apparent: a strong, articulate woman meets-cute with an understandably smitten man, both unfazed by the prospect of overseas employment yet sharing some past experience of heartbreak, venturing into less-familiar scenic spots while exchanging wit-laden insights into each other’s situations, ending with a bittersweet lack of closure that heightens their newly formed romantic bond. One may wonder how such a plain, by-now predictable formula can continue to yield such a well-received series of follow-up projects, but TTCT is long-ago enough to provide us with clues. The first would be a light directorial touch, reminiscent of the French romantic comedies (notably those of Eric Rohmer), successfully appropriated by Richard Linklater for his Before trilogy (1995-2013) as well as by Korean filmmaker Hong Sang-soo. The next would be a feminist spin on the manic pixie dream-girl, a Hollywood stock character who winds up being domesticated by the man she falls for; TTCT’s self-ironic neurotic lead female refuses to yield to her male partner’s bemused stoicism, instead winning him over to her impulsively free-spirited approach to life. A special touch that only TTCT has been able to pull off so expertly that the entire movie takes on the quality of a well-remembered pleasant dream is when the heartbroken woman reaches for an ideal of true love via John Lloyd Cruz’s character in Cathy Garcia-Molina’s One More Chance (2007). The reflexive touch is unobtrusive mainly because of the credible manner in which Antoinette Jadaone succeeds in integrating it into the narrative. (Not surprisingly, her earlier indie project and full-length debut, Six Degrees of Separation from Lilia Cuntapay [2011], foregrounded this process by letting the main subject play herself in a mock-documentary.) TTCT affirms its innovative roots by being lesser-budgeted than its progeny, but overflowing with so much spunk and wisdom that it still manages to surpass all the rom-coms that it had since inspired.

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