Follow these two steps carefully. Step 1: Skim through your grade-school to high school history books; and Step 2: Rush to the nearest theater and purchase a ticket for Mark Meily's biopic El Presidente.
If you have done the procedure aforementioned successfully, you already have watched three-quarters of the movie. Don't get me wrong, this is no exaggerated horse-crap. As a historical film, one would expect a lot of untold stories to be told, but new information (if any) that was inserted in the movie only range from little to nothing; most of them we already have read in our youths (depending on how much of a bookworm you were).
The movie follows Emilio Aguinaldo (Jeorge "E.R" Estregan) in the entirety of his life. After all, this is a biopic. The reason I am saying this is because Aguinaldo's life is rather eventful. The kind that would fill an entire movie franchise. Meily seemed to have been overwhelmed by the proportion of the picture and found himself clueless on how to execute the movie with equal competence and subtlety. He tries to add these different touches, some ingenious, some mundane, to the movie in order to (perhaps) put the movie in a much safer place. The result is utter unevenness.
Think of the movie as Steve Rogers lifting a hundred-pound barbell. (He isn't Captain America yet, just for this example's sake). Rogers, naturally, would sway due to the largeness and heaviness of the object.
Estregan's performance is somewhat middling when compared to his previous Manila Kingpin: The Asiong Salonga Story. It may be how his character is executed, of course. But there is dullness in his expressions as compared to his co-stars who ultimately outstages him. Nora Aunor (Thy Womb), Cesar Montano (The Great Raid) and Christopher De Leon (Dekada '70) appear briefly, but has provided great performances. Felix Roco (Madaling Araw, Mahabang Gabi) made a plausible portrayal as Gregorio Del Pilar.
Meily's ambitious depiction of history in El Presidente is commendable, but it is overwhelmingly heavy that it eventually collapses. The storytelling tend to shake a lot, as do the movie as a whole; then it all falls apart. Its subject matter, well-staged action sequences and impressive production however make it a towering piece of work. But one shall be reminded: this movie is not the boss of you. You can freely skip if you really want to.
VERDICT: B+
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