Here’s a critical look at how Martika Ramirez Escobar’s Leonor Will Never Die is deserving of the Special Jury Award: Innovative Spirit at the largest independent film festival in the US
By Inez Chuidian
At 11 p.m. on Jan. 23, three cinematic dimensions unfolded in front of me, as Martika Ramirez Escobar’s debut film, Leonor Will Never Die, breathed its last breath through its final screening. The 2022 Sundance Festival film is a composite art that explores the ventures of Lola Leonor as she falls into her unfinished screenplay, but this one plotline later diverges to convey indirect messages to its varying audiences. While the twisting 90-minute film will bring you to the brink of tears while also bringing you hollow laughter, Leonor Will Never Die is a movie of depth, with greater themes that are not so obvious to the general audience, but symbolic and intriguing to the community of film buffs and cinematic explorers.
For the mainstream viewers
To the public eye, Leonor Will Never Die is an adventure film with a Filipino’s favorite conventional genres. From the forbidden love of our soap operas to the flair and color of Vice Ganda, there’s something for every Pinoy.
When Lola Leanor is struck on the head by a neighbor’s falling TV, she finds herself waking up in the cinematic universe of her unfinished screenplay. In wide paneled reality, she passes her time finishing screenplays she once started as a young filmmaker. This revival of her creativity serves as an escape from her broken family and restless mind. Her sadness is further seen when she converses with her late son Ronwaldo as a ghostly confidante to her troubles.
When Leonor falls into her screenplay through a coma, not only does she fall into a new world itself, but she also falls into a world of ideals. As Filipinos, television and western media heavily project themselves into our culture. Internationally known as people of songs and smiles, the Filipino, at least on the surface, appears to have been created for television broadcasting. Leonor’s life of ideals only existing in her cinematic universe parallels the Pinoy idolization of Western TV stars and, essentially, “The American Dream.”
In the dimension on screen, Leonor’s idea of family is complete, and her deceased son lives vicariously through her fictional character, Ronwaldo. Here, she has the ability to control the narrative of this world. This new on-screen dimension contrasts her reality of a dysfunctional family and a world that seems to ignore her attempts to be present in it—as the opening scenes are of her monotonous house chores.
Leonor’s TV world is not just an expression of her desires fuelled by her creative mind, but a social commentary on the Filipino romanticism of television. As telling as it is, Filipinos love the stage, the glamor, and the drama of putting on a show. This is what allures the entire nation to entertainment. And likely a reason that politicians, such as Joseph “Erap” Estrada, find it easy to transition from public personalities to the great political heights, such as the presidency. Fernando Poe, Jr. almost made it. Manny Pacquiao and Isko Moreno may make it, the two being among the major palace bets in the May 2022 elections.
In fact, Leonor resembles the millions of Filipinos today, who idolize the cinema world to the extent that a world of fantasy is likely of higher value, than the real one we live in.
For the film buffs
To the young secret admirers of cinematography, however, Leonor Will Never Die is fruitful for interpretation. Hidden behind Martika Escobar’s layers of cinematic dimensions, one action is repeated constantly, the rewriting of the plot. The twist in our hearts when a character gets shot is reversed, then acted through again and again until the scene plays through, and the plot continues. To viewers, these repeated rewinds and reenacting of scenes come as surprising—almost interrupting—but they recur throughout the film, with artistic intention.
As Leonor hides from the antagonistic gang members of her screenplay, her fingers rise as she continues to write the plot. In this moment, Leonor is, literally, controlling the narrative that has become her life. As the film ends, the camera pans to the point that the movie we once saw becomes merely a panel on a computer’s editing screen. Producer Martika Escobar is then seen on a rooftop as she questions how to properly end such a film. She converses multiple ending possibilities before introducing the closing sequence of Leonor singing in her TV dimension.
Now this is where the movie separates the film lovers from the mainstream viewers—Martika repeatedly uses this act of rewriting the scene to convey a large reflection of the creative mind. By rewriting her own story and including it in the film’s final cut, we see how she and Leanor are alike. The two women (Leonor the actor and Martika the film’s creator) rewrite the story until the ending satisfies them. The two women represent creativity, but also express how life is somewhat like an unending movie, whose ending we constantly try to alter.
Contrasting Filipino gender norms by taking authority in the metaphorical movie that is their lives, Leonor and Escobar reflect the cinematic perspective that life is a movie, in which our actions represent our rewritten scenes to control the narratives based on our choice. With this notion, Escobar writes in between the lines, about the beauty of film direction in its key resemblance to our daily lives.
While the twisting 90-minute film will bring you to the brink of tears while also bringing you hollow laughter, Leonor Will Never Die is a movie of depth, with greater themes that are not so obvious to the general audience, but symbolic and intriguing to the community of film buffs and cinematic explorers.
The verdict: mainstream viewers vs. film buffs
Although the 2022 Sundance film is now a recipient of the Special Jury Award: Innovative Spirit,” it is fair to say that Leonor Will Never Die is an artistic film that may not appeal to everyone. Its varying layers of depth can resonate with all yet none. The film’s well done cinematography may intrigue viewers, but can only be appreciated to its full extent by those with a deeper understanding of film conventions. Truly, as Martika Escobar describes it, it is “a tiny, strange film.”