Presented in the World Cinema Dramatic Competition of the 2022 Sundance Film Festival, Martika Ramirez Escobar’s creative feature debut, Leonor Will Never Die, pays tribute to classic Filipino cinema through an absurd meta-filmmaking drama.
The 2022 Sundance Film Festival has opened, and we are glad to be a part of it, from January 20th to 30th. Among the first titles we have discovered this year is Leonor Will Never Die, coming from the Philippines and director Martika Ramirez Escobar. Produced by Monster Jimenez and Mario Cornejo, the film received its World Premiere in the World Cinema Dramatic Competition.
Martika Ramirez Escobar’s debut feature film shows a playful, yet sincere portrayal of how to approach one’s end of life. In this case, Leonor, a former film director in the Philippines, who is in her aging years, is showing signs of forgetfulness and incognizance throughout her daily life. The film follows the Leonor and her family, but once her retrospection of her films reminds her of her passion, the film takes a creative turn blending the magic of cinema and reality.
With the previous year’s genre of autobiographical meta filmmaking such as Bergman Island (Mia Hansen-Løve, 2021) and The Souvenir Part II (Joanna Hogg, 2021), Martika showcases her own rendition of a fictional narrative of meta filmmaking through her vessel and main character, Leonor. Leonor, who appears to be in her 70s, finds a “call for entry” advertisement in the newspaper and digs up an old script titled, Ang Pagbabalik Ng Kwago (The Return of Kwago), which Martika, seamlessly begins the credits for the film within the actual film. The retro aesthetic is one to marvel at in this film. It’s color grading and switch to 4:3 aspect ratio sends them back to the 70s reminiscent of classic 70/80s Filipino films. The film then inserts Leonor within the film as a spiritual guide as her last hurrah before her impending end.
Going back and forth between the film within the film and present day, her son Rudie, is her unofficial care taker (and gets no help from the husband). The film within the film begins to take over the narrative, showing parallels and the history of Leonor’s past and present life, while Rudie is running around the town doing errands and worrying about Leonor’s health. With many interesting and funny side plots such as a ghost interacting with the real world, a couple’s TV mishap, and a super meta conversation (with the director herself), Markita does not shy away from being free and creative. This film is very much influenced by Filipino cinema and culture, showcasing all the tropes of Filipino cinema in a respectful fashion from political corruption, gangsters, over-the-top action, melodrama, all centered around personal family issues that Leonor can never escape from.
Martika shows us an absurd and honest story with Leonor leading the efforts. With her backdrop of the film within the film, Martika elaborately weaves through two stories, one about Leonor, and the other, Leonor’s film. If anything, I could see this as one of the more creative films for the World Dramatic Competition due to it not sticking to a traditional narrative structure and also being about cinema. Leonor does use cinema as the central driving force of this film, which will immortalize Leonor and maybe, she’ll never die because we can watch her again and again in her cinema.
