It's great to start the year feeling good about life despite trials and setbacks along the way. One of the Metro Manila Film Festival (MMFF) movies that has put us in such a positive mindset is "When I Met You In Tokyo" starring Vilma Santos (who won the Best Actress plum in the Gabi ng Parangal) and Christopher de Leon along with Darren Espanto, Cassy Legaspi and Gabby Eigenmann.
To be honest, this romcom was not in the top five of our picks. I'm more into horror movies and documentaries and besides, I wasn't really taken by the trailer of "When I Met You In Tokyo." But a friend invited me to watch it, and that's how I found there's more to the movie than what I expected.
The story is about two Overseas Filipino Workers who met in Japan. Already in their senior years, their top concerns at the time revolved around their jobs, preparing for retirement, health, helping family back in the Philippines, etc. Both jaded about finding true love especially at their age, it was a sight seeing them suddenly acting like teenagers all giddy with kilig.
If "When I Met You In Tokyo" were a song, I'd say it's in the soft adult contemporary genre. There are laughs along the way but not too much; and tears will be shed too but not to drench the hanky. There's the coochie coochie feeling whenever Vilma and Christopher as husband and wife in the movie would act sweet towards each other, but these are sobered up by the realities they faced particularly halfway through the story.
I applaud WIMYIT for reminding people that life is a big mystery and single people should not lose hope because love is real and it can happen to you at any time. I also enjoyed seeing the beauty of Japan on the big screen---so quiet and refreshing!
Being a former OFW myself, it's good that people here in the Philippines are shown how difficult working abroad is; that their lives are far from the happy photos they post on Instagram or the hard earned money they are able to send to loved ones.
Most importantly, we love the message that there is a silver lining in everything. You just have to know where to look and how to look at things; and to be brave enough to do so.
Now, for the burning question that trended on Twitter right after the Gabi ng Parangal: Does Vilma Santos "dasurv" the award?
I can't say because I've yet to watch all 10 entries. I've not even completed the movies of the nominees in her category. Still, while I think this isn't Vilma's best performance in her decades-long, multi-awarded career, she said during her acceptance speech that she purposely did not go for over-the-top acting in this movie. In fact, Christopher de Leon would even remind her to tame it in some of the scenes.
Without resorting to comparison to measure her skills by, I'd say Vilma gave what was needed in WIMYIT, and that she shone in key scenes.
Now, the only way to find out if she won the award fair and square is for people to watch "When I Met You In Tokyo," then the other nine entries.
If you do, and by then, you'd have Vilma feeling like the winner that she is. After all, she said her only objective in joining this year's MMFF was to help woo Filipinos to watch local films again in theaters.
Seeing the long lines in the cinemas these days, that's a win for Vilma, with or without a trophy.
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