Kyle Angelo Walsh M.

Atega

2014-50986

How Mainstream Movies Make I More Smarter

Recent times have seen a rise in people who dislike mainstream Filipino films,
preferring instead films made by independent filmmakers. That is, if they even like
Filipino films at all. For some, there is no distinction between mainstream and indie
Filipino films. As a result, they end up disliking all Filipino films believing that they all
suffer the same problems even when that is simply not the case. The idea that mainstream
Filipino movies are dumb is so ubiquitous that it created that misconception. There are
two very common criticisms towards mainstream Filipino films.
The first is that a lot of them deal with shallow subject matters that rely on tired
and overused tropes. For instance, the main character suddenly realizes that his or her
true love was right there all along. But its a race against time because for some reason or
another, the true love happened to be in the airport about to leave the country! If there is a
significant emotional moment that happens between romantic partners, a sunny day turns
into pouring rain in three seconds. A working class parent just got paid and decided to
surprise his family by bringing home some pancit. These are tropes unique to Filipino and
there seems to be little backlash outside of the middle class educated youth.
The second one is the notion that movies rely more on star power rather than story.
How can really bad movies earn so much at the box office? Its because no matter how bad
a film about Bimby is, people will see it because the film stars Kris Aquino, Vic Sotto, and
Jaclyn Jose. This is why a film like My Little Bossings, which was almost universally
panned by critics, not only opened first at the box office, but also broke records in ticket
sales while doing so. This is not exclusive to Filipino films, of course. Surely the
Hollywood films Nine Lives where Kevin Spaceys character magically turns into a cat
falls under the category of films that used a famous actors name to justify the ridiculous
story to audiences. The difference is that even with Kevin Spacey, not a lot of people went
to see it because everybody knew that the story was ridiculous and not worth the time. The
pull of star power is clearly stronger in the mainstream Filipino films scene.
 All three of these criticisms are not disjunct from one another; rather they are part
of a greater criticism towards mainstream films in general from the Frankfurt school and
particularly Theodor Adorno. Films are cultural texts, and so in order to understand its
meaning, we have to analyze not only the text itself, but also the context of the texts
creation, or the industry that produced that text. Theodor Adorno discussed pop music, but
we can generalize his concerns to pop culture in general. Pop culture is a modern
invention: Beethoven, though he was certainly popular during his time, was not part of
pop culture. Pop cultures essence lies not in how popular something is, but in mass
production that allows something to be consumed with little barriers to access. Adorno
argued that the fundamental characteristic of pop culture is standardization. Pop culture
is manipulated by producers into a system of response mechanisms wholly antagonistic
to the ideal of individuality in a free, liberal society. Adornos concern, in other words,
was that pop culture created formulaic products that made no demands on the consumer
other than consume, which made for passive consumers who dont critically analyze
the media they consume at all. This is the cause of the first criticism about the overuse of
clichs and tropes.
The ownership of the popular film industry has become concentrated in a few
corporations, and this is the reason why concerns about formula have escalated. These
corporations control what media is distributed, and thereby shaping the preferences of the
viewer. This is why an answer to the question of why do Filipinos like bad films could
be because only bad films are made popular by corporations. This is called the political
economy approach- the ability for corporations with large market shares to strongly
influence demand using the products they supply. In economics, we call this supplier-
induced demand. Because these corporations are profit-oriented, they maximize profits
by sticking to a tried and tested formula that appeals to the lowest common denominators.
Adornos point is that the mainstream is more likely to churn out movies that make
people dumb.
However, this is not the only way to look at it. The field of audience studies rose
as a response to Adorno and what some scholars call Frankfurt pessimism. This is
where Ill discuss the role that mainstream movies play in shaping public discourse and
smartening up audiences. The crux of audience studies is that even if we were to accept
the organizational account of mass production, there are a lot of redeeming qualities in
pop culture. In studying audiences, we find a unique way of analyzing art. It is not bad to
enjoy mainstream films that are bad, but we have to know why we enjoy the media we
consume because its only then do we become critical smart viewers.
Films are not simply products, but experiences that are always laden with
ideology. Louis Althusser argued that ideology permeates most of our actions, which
serve as apparatuses for our ideologies. This exists even in our choices in what movies to
enjoy or in the choices of filmmakers in what kinds of movies they produce. This means
that movies are objects of ideologies even when we do not realize it. Even in my earlier
example of a famously bad mainstream Filipino movie, My Little Bossings is still
ideological in the sense that it provides us with a means of analyzing our cultural
evaluations of children, and the reason why many people watched it and ended up
enjoying it wasnt because of the presence of star power, but because they related to those
cultural evaluations. Films, even bad ones, can smarten up viewers when they analyze
why those films appealed to them so much. In this way, the movie doesnt shape the
smartness or dumbness of a person, but the other way around: the person determines the
smartness or dumbness of a movie. In movies that we have emotional connections with,
we form not a template for the quality of a film, but a template for the self. In other
words, movies allow us to explore our own belief systems and ourselves. This is
consistent with the idea that movies are thought experiments- they ask you what you
would do if you experienced the same things.
In mainstream movies, we find a template for the values of the Filipino masses.
This is not to say that Filipino masses value stupid plots, but perhaps that for the Filipino
masses, the plot is not as important as the escapism we feel while watching movies. In
Babae sa Septic Tank 2: Forever is Not Enough, Eugene Domingo tells an independent
director that people do not go to watch the movies in order to feel sad about real life. If
they wanted to do that, they wouldnt have gone to the movies at all. This, I think, sums
up my point. For the mainstream Filipino audience, films are more about the feelings that
you get, rather than the film itself. Mainstream movies are smart because they understand
the wants of consumers that the consumers themselves may not understand. This means
that contrary to Adorno, that there are no dumb movies- even ones that rely on a formula.
 What if we then consider a dumb viewer watching a mainstream movie? So far,
we have assumed that viewers are always critical of the media they consume, but we
should also consider the case in which a viewer does not analyze the cultural implications
of mainstream films (as is the case with a lot of viewers). We return to the notion of
ideology. Mainstream movies, because they reach such a wide audience, are also the best
places to insert ideologies that force a filmgoer to be critical. For example, Last Night,
produced under Star Cinema, touches upon the subject of suicide. Walang Forever
discusses the tragedies brought about by cancer. A Second Chance did away with typical
romantic fantasies in order to show the harshness of marriage. On the Job, also produced
by Star Cinema, discusses political killings and contract killers. Even Vince and Kath and
James used the social ambiguities that result from technology to tell a mainstream story.
What do all these examples mean? The fact that mainstream stories from mainstream
producers insert smart subject matter means that even for the uncritical viewer,
mainstream movies allow for surprisingly profound reflections in their audiences. Why is
this so? It is because even an uncritical viewer will need variety in how stories are
presented to him, and that variety invites producers to integrate new and novel ideas into
their movies. From there, the viewer is forced to contemplate what he or she has watched
moving forward.
What we have so far is this: first, mainstream Filipino movies are not dumb
contrary to popular belief, even though the organizational account of profit-oriented
companies is true. It is only because of a lack of critical analysis into mainstream films
do we think this way. Second, even if particular viewers remain uncritical with how they
consume media, mainstream Filipino films are likely to integrate profound subject matter
into otherwise generic films. This is because there is an incentive on the part of
mainstream producers to touch on those things without alienating the mass audience. In
doing this, it becomes a valuable first step towards creating more discussions in the
future. The final step in the analysis is the worst-case scenario in which mainstream
movies never change and never discuss smart subject matter. At the very worst-case,
mainstream films that do not stray from the formula encourage the creation of
independent films that do stray from that formula. It is no coincidence that weve seen a
steady rise in the popularity of independent films in mainstream audiences. In fact, the
top grossing Filipino film in 2017 is Kita Kita, an independent film, which earned
P320,000,000 at the box office. It earned more than the mainstream film My Ex and Whys
which earned P300,000,000.
What this means is that if mainstream movies stick to formula, films willing to
break those formulas, ones that are more experimental, ones that deal with more
complicated subject matter, will overshadow them. This is because eventually, audiences
grow tired of the same tired tropes being shown again and again, and will demand for
innovative movies. Weve seen this from the most recent MMFF, from the Pista ng
Pelikulang Pilipino where audiences pressured cinemas to extend the showings of
independent movies, from the success of movies like Birdshot which very explicitly
(spoilers) criticizes police brutality and the part that the police force plays in keeping the
elite in power. This shows that even if mainstream Filipino movies do not budge, they
still play a role in the creation of smarter films by acting as one of the catalysts towards
innovation.