Preserving ‘Ibong Adarna’
Tuesday, May 10th, 2005‘Ibong Adarna’ as a time capsule
THERE is nothing like seeing a true classic like Vicente Salumbides’ film, “Ibong Adarna,” restored and screened recently at the UP Film Center for the first time since its release in 1941, to realize just how derelict we have been in preserving the signposts and products of our culture.
The picture was one of around 20 movies LVN Productions managed to produce before Japanese bombs rained down on Manila in December of that year. Sadly, only one other LVN film from that period survives-”Giliw Ko,” which, like “Ibong Adarna,” starred Mila Del Sol.
Still mesmerizing
“Ibong Adarna” was considered a noteworthy production for the level of sophistication it brought to the art of local motion pictures. Released in the same year Orson Welles’ “Citizen Kane” thrilled audiences in the West with its groundbreaking synthesis of available film technologies at the time, “Ibong Adarna” represented an ambitious attempt by a homegrown movie studio to approximate the best conventions of Hollywood filmmaking.
Viewing the film now, restored to adequate if not pristine condition (the black-and-white cinematography by Remigio Young, Ray Lacap and Salumbides remains mesmerizing, but the glorious music of Francisco Buencamino Sr. and Jr. has warped considerably), is to realize how local films of this period were so much a product of their time and place-that is, of an era when the Philippines was a colony of America and, by extension, Hollywood.
But while 1941 already saw the world’s film capital moving to a new direction with “Citizen Kane” and other novel releases like John Ford’s “How Green Was My Valley” (which won the Best Picture Oscar over “Kane”), John Huston’s “The Maltese Falcon,” Alfred Hitchcock’s “Suspicion,” Howard Hawks’ “Sergeant York,” Frank Capra’s “Meet John Doe,” William Wyler’s “The Little Foxes” and Preston Sturges’ “Sullivan’s Travels,” LVN produced a film that took its cue from well-defined streams of early American cinema.
Popular corrido
With its whimsical costumes, elaborate studio sets, theatrical blocking and arched, elocutionary dialogue, “Ibong Adarna” owed much to the swashbuckling films associated with Douglas Fairbanks Sr. like “The Thief of Baghdad,” crossed with the hokey grandeur of Cecil B. De Mille’s “cast-of-thousands” spectacles and even a bit of Charlie Chaplin’s mimetic comedy routines.
Before it was made into a film, “Ibong Adarna” existed as a popular corrido about three princes from the Kingdom of Berbania who travel to a forest in search of an enchanted bird. The adarna’s sweet songs, it is said, will cure the princes’ father of a lingering illness. As in all fables, the brothers’ journey becomes a test of bravery, goodness and gallantry in pursuit of honor and a beautiful woman to bring home to the kingdom.
In making a film version of this tale, Salumbides and his team found an excuse in the Moorish, “Arabian Nights” flavor of the story to go to town with flamboyant technical and production values. Were it in full color, “Ibong Adarna” would have rivaled the intense imagery of the Hollywood “Arabian Nights” that was released only a year later, starring Jon Hall and Maria Montez.
Such proficiency can be seen in the panoramic matte backdrops of the imposing palace and the kingdom of Berbania, in the tricky long shots of the royal court that simulate great depth and dimension, and the famous colored sequence of the bird bursting into full plumage, which was reportedly painted on frame by frame.
Unfortunately, this highlight wasn’t in the extant copy of the film that was restored, so the sequence now stands as a series of flickering fade-to-black scenes as the bird changes plumage seven times. Likewise, part 6 of the film stock was nowhere to be found and is presumably lost forever, so the restored version has a considerable jump in its narrative.
Fine showcase
Still, what is left is a fine showcase of vintage Filipino filmmaking at its most imaginative and ingenious.
One may argue that “Ibong Adarna,” for all its technical dazzle, merely refracted vaunted Hollywood conventions. The influences are apparent enough: The palatial set-ups recall De Mille. The framing and choreography of the royal dancers has Busby Berkeley written all over them. And Canuplin, playing the court jester, unabashedly channels Chaplin, down to a wordless slapstick sequence performed flawlessly in sync with the music.
There’s even a musical number near the end that has Fred Cortes (a stunningly handsome Valentino look-alike, if a rather effete actor) crooning his basso profundo to Del Sol’s high soprano, a la Nelson Eddy and Jeanette McDonald.
Homespun wisdom
Such cinematic larceny, however, deserves to be overlooked in the face of the quintessentially Filipino spirit that imbues the whole production.
The story itself is steeped in homespun Pinoy wisdom, with seasoned aphorisms like “Ang hindi marunong lumingon sa pinanggalingan…” actually making it to the script as dialogue. Much of “Ibong Adarna,” in fact, sounds less like a movie as we know it today, and more like a primary-school storytelling aid, with its deadpan emphasis on robust Christian values despite the riot of Ottoman-era finery filling the screen.
For a 1941 film, “Ibong Adarna” is also surprisingly fast-paced and straightforward. More astoundingly, its women are strong-willed, intelligent and quick with verbal comebacks, and not the simpering Maria Claras Filipinas were often thought of at that time.
How much of this might be attributed to LVN’s being run then by a formidable woman herself, Doña Narcisa Vda de Leon, is grist for conjecture. But it does give “Ibong Adarna” a recognizably modern temperament on top of its thrilling aesthetics.
That, above all, is what makes this film a valuable cultural heirloom.
Vintage movies like “Ibong Adarna” are time capsules that offer us a peek into our history and evolving habits as a people. The fact that it’s one of only two of their kind left today is a national tragedy. [source]
May 09, 2005
By Gibbs Cadiz
Inquirer News Service
Also published on page A28 of the May 10, 2005 issue of the Philippine Daily Inquirer.