FOR A DECADE now, the mainstream Filipino movie industry has languished in a deep and dismal slump, with its annual output cut down from a high of 200 features to a low of less than 50. ?Indie? films have tried to fill in the blank, but many of its productions haven?t substantially reached and connected with the huge mainstream audience.
Popularity
Instructively, at about the same time, television has surged to unprecedented heights of popularity, with its daytime and evening teleseryes topping the ratings and pulling in millions of viewers?just like a big mainstream movie used to do.
Thus, our latest pop-cultural epiphany: Contrary to the usual pessimistic scuttlebutt, the Filipino movie industry isn?t dead, it isn?t dying?it?s alive and well: On TV.
The last time we counted, there were some 20 different drama series on the small screen. With the major channels changing series from three to four times a year apiece, that?s an annual total of some 100 different productions. ?That?s an entire ?film? industry?s very respectable annual output right there!
Star value
Of course, TV drama series really aren?t movies?but, wait a minute: Other similarities include the series? star value, with multiple TV-movie luminaries headlining them to assure strong viewer interest, and the shows? budgets that run into the millions, some of them rivaling the big bucks invested in blockbuster films.
Plus: These days, many teleseryes use the titles and plots of movies that were popular many years ago, further strengthening the film-TV connection.
Note, too, that many movie stars aren?t facing the film cameras these days, so they would be jobless and penniless?if they weren?t so busy acting in teleseryes. So, the serial TV ?movies? have also provided the important service of keeping many film stars financially secure and solvent. And they are able to practice their craft?well, sort of.
That?s one of the negative aspects of this TV-movie equation: The acting on teleseryes is generally stereotypical, overly melodramatic, full of sound and fury signifying little?and thus, not really very good. In fact, sometimes, it?s quite bad.
One of the reasons for this is the fact that daily soaps ?have? to be full of ?colorful? characters, situations, problems and complications, in order to keep regular viewers interested and watching. Each daily ?chapter? ?has? to end with a new dramatic twist that will be resolved in the following day?s installment, and that doesn?t make for good storytelling or acting.
Victims
Worse, hit teleseryes end up as victims of their own success. To make more money out of popular drama series, they are stretched out for months, and their original storylines get so distended that they end up making no sense at all.
Worst of all, to economize, teleseryes are produced in ?round the clock taping binges with many sequences shot per day. As any TV worker will tell you, that numbing schedule soon takes its toll on everybody?s performance. After a while, cast and crew members become mere factory workers who simply churn out quantity rather than quality.
So, everything considered, TV series don?t end up as good ?movies??but, they are popular, and that makes them ?mainstream.? So they still end up as yet another alternative ?film? industry to help all of us bide our time, until the real movie industry recovers!
