Kisapmata by Mike de Leon (1981)

The interior of the house was well planned letting tatang see everything that was happening inside and outside the house. He can easily see the people entering and stepping out of his room. Tatang can easily access Mila’s room, the living room in which the telephone was located. Doors locked indoors and gates are only to be opened in specific times. Reflecting the events during the martial law where curfews were implemented.


At the beginning of the film, we were presented by a scene that shows a dark background and audio with a creepy and eerie sound that gives discomfort and somehow chills to the viewers. The introduction of the suffocating grip tatang has presented to Mila and nanang at the start of the movie. It makes us feel the terror that was suppressed to them. In parallel it was the same move Marcos did to the Filipinos, he ruled us by terror, setting himself as the authority and the law.


Tatang is above everything and everyone. Tatang became the law, acting as the god and the controller. They are scared of him, everyone was frightened. Mila hates tatang but cannot leave him. When you think of it, this is what happened to the individuals and the sovereignty in the Philippines. The film lets us feel the terror of the Marcos regime. A regime of force and fear to control people, governance. We can remember that tatang can say sorry and all, act like a loving father but he still uses fear to it.


The story was revolving around an incest story. An incest of presidency continuously affecting the generations that were affected by the ruling terror. For a time Marcos might have thought because he loved what he was doing, he loved the power and contributed well until he was consumed by it and started manipulating the power.


Tatang was an Ilocano with a strong character, a strong mouth, and a controlling figure. The satire of tatang as police is the depiction of Marcos as part of the military. Both characters tried to use what they had as training to set authority and control the people below them. The wife had no power, the voice of media and common people did not explicitly drop-down words to fight against the dictatorial regime’s corrupt ruling.


We can remember that there was a scene in the movie where other police were selling a gun to Tatang and the conversation went around saying, in politics, the person that gets promoted are people that stick with the one on power and the gun they were selling was because of confiscation from another person. It is a symbolism of how the politics were held in his regime. An example of this is the Rolex 12, they stick to the one on power to have their own business on progress. The daughter Mila is a reflection of the people that used religion that did nothing to help them but only had the freedom she wanted when she took action for escaping.


Throughout the story, tatang was portrayed as a realistically. THe guilt feeds him. he would apologize and act normally again but as the plotline goes we realized that he is a psychotic father. It was also narrated in a story outline with dates being stated. It connotes a diary that could have probably really happened. During martial law, some protested some fought against it and not until everyone made an action to it. Tatang wants the best for their wedding but does he really want the best for them when all the convincing fails use money to tighten the situation. The 10,000 pesos worth of money to get Mila became both their debt. The result of martial law made us in debt until now. The room shots were shot in a tight shot. If I remember correctly everything that happened inside the house was shot in kind of a close-up shot where in you could easily recognize the characters expression and the sound for the film had the theme set that when something bad is happening it will give you an indicator that something bad will actually be happening. But through the end it was ended with a light, fun background music, letting us wonder why would the director do that?


We cannot easily forget a tragedy that hit a number of people. After everyone and tatang was killed, we can relate this just like what happened after Martial Law, it left Filipinos the idea of not knowing what to do next. The dates in the movie were indicated to note that the events in Kisapmata somehow happened. The film relates it to martial law by showing us that the feeling left by the film is the effect the Filipinos had after martial law. It was a tragic but an event where we can see any future with. Just like the story in Things Fall Apart where the main characters vision all falls back leaving him with nothing to begin with. When you try to control everything but it came to a point what you’ve been controlling all along cannot be in control anymore you try to once again control it by pulling a trigger and ending the story of you ending their lives. It might also ended that way that the stories of the Filipinos might night have to be happy ending but it is a painful truth that we portray with smiles because as what the title says, Kisapmata. Just a blink of an eye, things might not and will never be the same again. An event we did not expect but kind of foresee. And if you expected it great, if you didn’t know where were you all along in this movie. Just like how we didn’t see Marcos' reelection vision the second time. We were blinded for quite some time and till we cannot fight back anymore. Kisapmata translates to in a blink of an eye of this is how you can kill a person, kill a life. A blink of an eye, we suddenly transitioned to a dictatorial regime. The ending was a fun sound because it wants gives the feeling like "whoops this happened, what we can do about it".



Original Photo retrived from: https://www.filmgeekguy.com/2018/10/mike-de-leon-kisapmata-itim-restored-version.html