MEDIUM RARE

Is Yorme’s movie showing? How many voters can afford a P350 ticket?

Fans of Isko Moreno, presidential candidate, can’t find the so-called biopic in the mall screenings despite press releases quoting his director’s announcement of a Dec. 1 playdate for “Yorme: The Isko Domagoso Story.” (Moreno or Domagoso? It can be confusing.)

As Erap will tell you, one movie does not a president make. In the 2021-22 campaign, Yorme, 46, is in the same age group as Manny Pacquiao, also a presidential aspirant, and Sara Duterte-Carpio, candidate for vp. In 2019, Yorme won the Manila elections on the basis of “energy,” being half the age of his two opponents.

Other politicians in other campaigns have taken the cinema path to hitch their wagon to a star, not all of them successfully, not as candidates and not as box-office hits. In Isko’s case, Xian Lim plays Yorme -- but why not Isko as Isko? The movie, according to director Joven Tan, is a musical featuring 15 original songs written by Joven.

With or without the movie, Isko the candidate is going places, literally, mobbed by young and old, east and west. Talk of President Duterte’s shipwrecked PDP on the brink of choosing him as their standard bearer made waves. “Who am I not to be thankful? Any help is welcome,” Yorme said before the rumor could be denied or verified.

Yorme is not one to sit on his hands as time rushes by. He was the first mayor to throw out the use of face shields. Before any other mayor dared to allow walk-ins and nonresidents to avail of the city’s supply of vaccines in fair weather or foul, he was doing it and courting Malacañang’s wrath.

His quickness of mind and spirit – born in the Year of the Tiger, 2022 is his year – is reflected in Manila’s transformation from a “dying city” (quoting PRRD) to an overnight sensation.

In two years the transformation has been nothing if not spectacular. You’ve to live or work in Manila to realize how dramatic the change has been. Too soon for the mayor of Manila to become president of the Philippines? Yorme, invite them skeptics to come over for a tour and see with their own eyes.