Sharon Cuneta Apparition Spotted Over London!

BY MADS BAJARIAS | First, take a movie still of Sharon Cuneta in full careworn splendor. Enlarge it! More! Bleed out the glamour by tacking on strands of dull hair to suggest a hard life (or a shampoo shortage). But not too much! The image must be resolute, not beaten-down. Now take a generic London pic. Remove those dreary English skies. Soft focus. Presto!

A Sharon flick must be like a double-edged sword for a movie-poster designer: It ensures a substantial marketing budget, but it also means that the bosses expect her mug to be plastered prominently in the posters, dampening the design process.

In this case, megawatt star power trumps imagination and originality.

So what we have in the poster is this: The proud city of London—the city that refused to bow to Hitler—finds itself under the nose of Sharon Cuneta. Her brimming tears threatening to rain down and flood the Houses of Parliament.

The producers of the movie "Caregiver" are not mooks, of course. They know that Sharon is the big kahuna here. So just slap on her face to a poster, surround it with immaculate white to evoke a Virgin Mary-like aura, and for good measure, paint London's landmarks gold to symbolize the treasures that await those willing to toil like Sharon's migrant worker. All hail Ate Shawie!

The image is a promise from the producers: As God is our witness, there will not be a dry eye in the house! Entire movie houses will be swept away in a Mudslide of Tears.

Does this poster alone make me want to run over to the cinema and fork over Php140 to watch the movie? Not really. I am no Sharon worshipper. I want unpredictability. I want a fresh idea. I don't want a Tsunami of Anguish. I see enough of those in my life, thank you. If I watch the movie, it will be for other reasons.

I wonder how Londoners will react to this poster. Surely the apparition hovering over their Big Ben like a blimp must be a puzzling sight to the natives? I imagine a perplexed London-born Hugh Grant asking: Who the bloody hell is she? Ah, she's the Megastar.

8.6.08 UPDATE: I've watched the movie. Where "Ploning" has a superb poster for a less-than-impressive movie, "Caregiver" has the opposite. The movie "Caregiver" steers clear of the cloying sentimentality and idolatry found in the poster-cum-Sharon closeup. In the movie, Sharon's healthy tear ducts were kept in check. Histrionics were at a minimum. The dialog was light, and clever at times. Simplicity, an element I failed to recognize in the poster, rules the day. Pretty good movie. Sharon worshippers will be proud.

Nuance Makes a Cameo in Movie Poster Art

BY MADS BAJARIAS | What a nicely evocative poster for the new Judy Ann Santos starrer "Ploning." This is such a relief from the deluge of Pinoy "fiesta-style" movie posters crammed with actresses to the last square inch. Or where Sharon Cuneta's pudding face fills up the poster space leaving the movie credits scrunched up in a corner.

This one has an understated design, yet there's enough to pique one's curiosity and interest. The calligraphy-style title is beautiful: its dynamism and circularity suggesting the yin-yang symbol and eternal renewal. The trailing brushstrokes on the "P" and the "G" seem to move toward each other. And the upper halves on the letters "PLONING" are like cresting waves, an image reinforced by the seascape background. The photoshopping of the actress' body and head, however, resulted in an unnaturally long neck. The blunt-worded tagline somewhat mars the overall effectiveness but, thankfully, the designer obscured it among those staples of the dramatic love story: sepia and tobacco-hued clouds.

All in all, not bad. This poster is enough to make me watch the movie.

***

21.5.08 UPDATE: I have seen the movie and, oh boy, all I can say here is that the movie doesn't quite match the promise of the poster--but the producers should be lauded for trying to make something smart, fresh and beautiful. There was a real effort by the makers to make something different and good. My thoughts about the movie, written immediately after viewing.

Flap Your Wings for these Posters

BY MADS BAJARIAS | Arnel Telesforo's poster for the Palawan Bird Festival, an event organized by the Wild Bird Club of the Philippines, to popularize birdwatching and raise the public's awareness about Philippine birds and their habitats. The splendid bird featured is the male Palawan Peacock-pheasant (Polyplectron emphanum), a creature that can only be found in the lowland forests of Palawan.

Telesforo's illustration-poster for the Cebu Bird Festival. The feet seem more polished and nicer here than those in the Palawan poster. Aside from being an artist, animator and filmmaker, Telesforo is also a teacher and a keen birdwatcher.