In 1986 filmmaker Nettie Wild happened to be in the Philippines during the “peaceful revolution” that brought Cory Aquino to power. Wild had gone there to make a political documentary; she had a crew, financing, and plenty of film, but she decided not to shoot a foot of it. Instead, in what she describes as “quite a controversial decision,” she left, intending to return after the thousand foreign press people had departed and the Aquino honeymoon had ended.
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Jun Pala is an anticommunist disc jockey who unabashedly performs for the camera, professing his admiration for Nazi propagandist Joseph Goebbels along with “God-centered ideology,” and, between records, broadcasting the names of suspected leftists. When Wild discovers that one of those he’s named has been hacked to death by a local death squad, she confronts him with that fact. He turns really ugly, promising, while still posing for the camera, that when his side gains more power, “I will kill them all, including the media.”
It’s the strength of characters such as these–and there are several others, including Kummander Dante, a former leader of the guerrillas who tries the electoral path–that draws the viewer in, and that drew the filmmaker in. “That’s the only reason that I made this film,” says Wild. “I became absolutely engrossed in these people and their stories.”
Not that this was the only problem Wild had to face. As an eight-week filming schedule grew to eight months, many in her crew had to leave, and Wild had to learn to operate camera and sound equipment herself–and this was a woman who had hardly even directed before, whose previous film experience consisted of making a small video on the housing crisis in Vancouver. Each night when they were in the mountains they’d bury the film and equipment–$100,000 worth, on loan from the Canadian National Film Board and several months overdue–so it wouldn’t fall into government hands if an attack came.
