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Baboy Halas: Wailings in the Forest
English Translation of Primary Title: Wild Boar
Language: Matigsalug
Year of Release: 2016
Director: Bagane Fiola
Screenwriters: Bagane Fiola, Bem Di Lera, Janna Moya
From a story by Bagane Fiola
Producers: QCinema International Film Festival, Origane Films, CoolLab Studios
Cast: Omeles Laglagan, Ailyn Laglagan, Vangelyn Panihao, Jhea Mae Laglagan, Danilo Casig, Sadam Dagsil, Rolly Panihao, Henyo Panihao, Ernesto Capal, Daniel Adang, Daniel Naran, Elvie Magwana, Imelda Lascuña, Jasmen Flores, Jessa Jaime, Lita Lantong, Merlie Lantong, Sheryl Arendain, Daniel Dagsil, Araiz Panihao, April Laglagan, Beah Maguana, Emily Dagsil, Felepe Lantong, Felix Laglagan, Janeth Lantong, John Philip Laglagan, Julius Laglagan, Lita Casig, Lolita Lantong, Mad Laglagan, Marcelino Singkianon, Mercy Laglagan, Nena Singkianon, Nenita Gordo, Nueme Panihao, Pepe Laglagan, Renato Lumin, Ruben Lantong, Taisan Panihao
[Note: spoilers provided] Despite the prayer of Datu (Chief) Bukaykay to their god Manama, Mampog has difficulty catching a wild boar, which his family relies on for their supply of meat. Du, another tribe member, convinces a woman from another tribe to live with him, in defiance of her commitment to another man. Her angered husband attacks Du and succeeds in killing him, resulting in a pangayaw or tribal war. In order to wage for peace, the man who killed Du agrees to provide Du’s tribespeople with five horses, although he pleads that two pieces of metal treasures be substituted for the fifth. Datu Bukaykay accepts the offer and the tribe members celebrate their husay or restoration of order. Meanwhile, Mampog takes leave of his two wives in order to hunt but, after performing a ritual in a cave, finds instead an unusual white-colored wild sow. He brings it home but refuses to slaughter it. At night, he sees the sow in the form of a white diwata or nymph and follows it through the forest, then loses track of it. He leaps into the river by a waterfall and surfaces to find several wailing nymphs surrounding him. Next day, one of his wives searches for him, bringing her hunting weapon. When she nears the falls, she finds a black boar and aims her arrow at it.
In ethnographic cinema, feature films on indigenous societies made by well-intentioned practitioners are always in danger of succumbing to the artist’s bias, with the subjects subjugated to the filmmaker’s vision. The impact of one such approach intended to minimize this problem, Jean Rouch’s cinéma vérité, was useful enough to be appropriated as one of the new devices in the toolbox of the French New Wave. An even more subject-responsive method, described as the “filmmaker-initiated mode of intercultural filmmaking” by Katrina Ross A. Tan in her article titled “Lumad Image-Making in Baboy Halas (2016) through Intercultural Filmmaking” (published in Akda: The Asian Journal of Literature, Culture, Performance), informs the entrancing execution of Baboy Halas. As such, it also requires more advanced prep than usual—one reason why its synopsis here is extensive, to the point of including plot twists. Bagane Fiola’s purpose is entirely laudable: to create a work whose primary audience would be the Matigsalug audience, witnessing themselves and hearing their language in film for the first time. This would place the rest of the global audience at a disadvantage, since the film eschews the use of a narrator and, admittedly admirably, deploys advanced storytelling devices. The film’s several incidents, premised on the parallel narratives of two tribesmen, are filled with nuances, implications, and interrelations, drawn from Fiola’s constant consultation with the datu and other members of the tribe, and explicated satisfactorily in Tan’s article. The rewards of responsible preparation provide extra benefits for the outside appreciator, as befits the best samples of ethnofiction: Who hasn’t wondered, for example, whether overfamiliar scenes of seduction, elopement, and bloody revenge in Westernized movies can incite the same level of suspense alongside amusement when played out by indigenous actors who’ll always stand out by their physical beauty and graceful movements in lush forests, where the sounds of nature provide a unique kind of accompaniment? Will the enchantment of forces that refuse to conform to our rational understanding prove terrifying to these people as they undoubtedly would to us? The answers lie in securing a copy of Baboy Halas and stepping into a world that even an ordinary Philippine audience would find enthralling.
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