2021 | 1h 45m | English subtitles
Written and Directed by: Jun Robles Lana
Starring: Christian Bables, Eugene Domingo, Gina Alajar, John Arcilla, Janice de Belen, Ricky Davao, Soliman Cruz, Nico Antonio, Gina Pareño, Sue Prado, VJ Mendoza, Awra Briguela
Followed by a Talkback with journalist/historian Luis Francia
Date: Friday, March 1, 2024 | 6:30 PM
Venue: NYU KJCC | 53 Washington Sq S, NYC 10012
Free and open to the public.
RSVP Link: https://bit.ly/panawin-s24
Synopsis
Dharna, a law-abiding gay beautician in one of the slums of Manila, finds their life in danger on learning that his name has been included in the village drug watchlist. In Duterte’s war on drugs, even having one’s name on the watchlist means the risk of getting killed extrajudicially. Dharna goes on a darkly comic day-long odyssey to try to get his name off the watchlist before it’s submitted to the police the following day.
Director’s Statement
In 2016, when Duterte came into power, he promised to solve the Philippines’ drug problem in 6 months. That in itself is already a great premise for a comedy of errors of biblical proportions. Using the drug war violence in the Philippines as backdrop, Big Night! follows the struggles of Filipinos living in the fringes. Through the lens of comedy and farce, I wanted to explore themes of disorder, dignity, exploitation and humanity. How do we restore order in society when our sense of “normal” and, more importantly, our sense of values, are distorted?
Notes on the Film
Big Night! does not waste time focusing on its central subject matter. A title card says: “… at the outset of its war on drugs, the Philippine government enlisted the help of village officials in gathering the names of drug suspects in every neighborhood in the country. This is called the ‘watch list.’”
The film opens on All Saint’s Day going into All Soul’s Day, when remembrances and visits to the dead are made throughout the country. A young man lights a candle at a cemetery as a radio report on the ongoing drug war blares in the background. The man rides a motorcycle into a slum area in Manila and casually shoots someone hanging out by a store. Situations like this have become so common in the Duterte drug war that after expressions of shock and even macabre humor, the villagers revert back to their preoccupations of just trying to survive and finding relief in their poverty-stricken lives.
This is not the case with Dharna (Christian Bables), a gay beautician who owns a modest beauty parlor in the slums. He/She learns from a friend that his old name, Panfilo Macaspac, Jr., is on the watch list of drug dealers and users. He was planning to spend the day helping his lover Zeus (Nico Antonio) finish the costume that Nico hopes would help him win the male beauty pageant that night, the Big Night, in a gay club. Dharna’s day turns instead into a Dickensian journey trying to get his name off the watchlist before it’s submitted to the police and he becomes an open target in the open season on drug suspects, sanctioned and whipped into a frenzy by the President.
Dharna, depicted by Christian Bables with such natural and quiet aplomb that many mistakenly assume that he’s gay in real life, turns into an Everyman as he journeys through the village and finds himself in the most unexpected situations, substituting for a malingering make-up artist at a funeral parlor which has become profitable due to the number of bodies coming in lately, indulging then tussling with a hypocritical religious fanatic who might have submitted his name to the watchlist, assisting an illegal midwife deliver two babies as he tries to enlist her help, and encountering the cursing and cigarette-smoking ghost of his mother who had turned cynical after death. In the hands of Lana and his assured and sprawling cast of actors, absurd situations turn into a mine of recognizable human satire on the conceits of the powerful and the accommodations made by the powerless, all the while exposing the madness of the drug war.
Duterte’s megalomaniacal fulfillment of what had seemed to be hyperbolic campaign speeches led to thousands of extrajudicial deaths in the hands of the police and vigilantes, the vast majority of those killed among the poor, several of them children and mere passersby. Death toll numbers range from some 6,200 per the report from the Philippine National Police to more than 8,500 according the UN Office for Human Rights and four times the police tally according to the Human Rights Commission of the Philippines.
Dharna’s story may not be over yet, with Lana announcing a sequel to Big Night! And the drug war story may still continue with major twists and turns, as current President Bongbong Marcos and erstwhile Duterte ally holds the threat of an International Criminal Court trial hanging over Duterte, and both Presidents now publicly accusing each other of being drug addicts.
By the time Lana produced Big Night! Philippine filmmakers, defying fear, had made the drug war a topic of urgent concern, with dramas, thrillers, or documentaries like like BuyBust, Respeto, Ma’ Rosa, Neomanila, Tao Po, and Aswang. Big Night! takes the untrodden high wire by transmuting tragedy into black comedy, in the process serving as a tribute to the drug war’s victims and as an indictment of the culture of impunity, fear and apathy during one of the most devastating chapters of the country’s history that continues to stagger between fragile democracy and tragic authoritarianism.
— Gil Quito, Curator
About the Director
Jun Robles Lana is a playwright, screenwriter, producer, and director. He is the youngest Filipino to be inducted into the Hall of Fame of the Palanca Awards, the Philippines’ most prestigious literary prize. In 1998, his prize-winning debut screenplay Sa Pusod ng Dagat/In the Navel of The Sea, was optioned and directed by his mentor Marilou Diaz-Abaya and had its world premiere at the Panorama Section of the Berlin International Film Festival.
He collaborated with various directors as a writer and also became the Creative Director for Drama of GMA Network Inc., the largest TV network in the Philippines, and later directed films for Regal Films, one of the most established movie studios in the country.
In 2012, he produced and directed his passion project, Bwakaw which opened at the Cinemalaya Independent Film Festival and received acclaim on the festival circuit including Toronto, New York, and Tokyo, and was picked up by Fortissimo Films for distribution. It also became the Philippines’ official entry to the Academy Awards that year.
His succeeding projects won various accolades, Mga Kuwentong Barbero/Barber’s Tales won awards in Hong Kong, Tokyo, and Madrid. Anino sa Likod ng Buwan/Shadow Behind the Moon won in Vladivostok and Kerala. Die Beautiful won in Tokyo and Kerala and became one of the Philippines’ highest-grossing films of 2016, Kalel, 15, won in Tallinn and Rome, and his recent film, About Us But Not About Us, won Critics Picks Best Film at the Tallinn Black Nights Film Festival and is going around the festival circuit in Sydney and Fantasporto. He also recently directed the first Filipino Amazon Original Movie, Ten Little Mistresses. Most recently, he wrote and directed Your Mother’s Son, which was invited to the Toronto International Film Festival, and Becky and Badette, a comedy about gender identity and viral celebrity.
— Idea First
Awards for Big Night!
- Urian Awards – Best Picture
- Metro Manila Film Festival – Best Picture, Director, Screenplay, Actor (Bables), Supporting Actor (Antonio), Cinematography, Musical Score
- FAMAS Awards – Best Screenplay, Supporting Actress (de Belen)
- Rome Asian Film Festival – Best Actor (Bables)
- Eddy Awards – Best Screenplay, Musical Score
