“I would highly appreciate very much if you would at least acknowledge any materials used or at least ask for a permission first. Unless specified, all other materials are from the private collection of the blog owner. Thank you very much!”

Thursday, November 26, 2009

REMEMBERING JOHNNY DELGADO THROUGH HIS FILMS #3: "SALOME" (1981)



"Salome" (1981)- Stars Gina Alajar, Johnny Delgado and Dennis Roldan/ Directed by Laurice Guillen

My short tribute to honor the late actor Johnny Delgado, whom I considered as one of the finest actors in the movie industry, ends with Salome. Salome was one of the early successful collaboration efforts of husband-and-wife tandem of actor Johnny Delgado and director Laurice Guillen. It was hailed by critics and fans as one of the best movies of the decade. The movie went on to win the Urian Best Picture for that year including Best Director (Laurice Guillen); Best Actress (Gina Alajar); Best Editing (Efren Jarlego) and Best Screenplay (Ricky Lee). Johnny Delgado was nominated for both in the Famas and Urian Best Actor.

Salome is about the titular barrio girl (played with much versatility by a young Gina Alajar) who is married to a domineering man named Macario (Johnny Delgado). The film starts quite wonderfully with a pleasant montage of an early morning in a rural town, with roosters crowing, the bright sun glaring, and the waves steadily blanketing the glistening beach. Then comes Salome, dressed in white stained with red blood, running and screeching for help, finally saying that he has killed a man. The man (Dennis Roldan) is a mining engineer from
Manila who finds himself drawn to Salome. Guillen and her screenwriter Ricardo Lee basically unravels Salome's story through a series of flashbacks of the man's murder. Some have claimed that Salome is a Filipino version of Akira Kurosawa's Rashomon and they are probably right as Guillen and Lee follows the same style. Yet while Kurosawa was interested in the multi-faceted aspect of truth, Guillen is more interested in the powerplay of the genders.
(Source: : Oggs Cruz (oggsmoggs@yahoo.com) and visit his site here)

Here's a short film clip of Delgado's riveting and forceful portrayal as the oppressive and dominant husband of Salome.


Courtesy of Bancom Audiovision

4 comments:

Rodolfo Samonte said...

Simon,
Excellent clip. Looks Laurice gathered an ensemble cast in the movie. I recognize Armida Siguion-Reyna and another great actor Tony Santos. And Gina Alajar is something else, what a fine actress. I saw her do a portray an excerpt of Jose Rizal's Maria Clara, she was quite amazing. Here'a a picture with her and dancer Lali Aldeguer of the Aldeguer Sisters, and also remember how I told you about the resemblance of the artist Johnny Delgado played, and he looked like Papo de Asis. Here's pictures also of Papo: http://picasaweb.google.com/rodolfo.samonte/Papo#

TheCoolCanadian said...

What's so good about Laurice Guillen is that she knows how to find an actor's strong attributes, explore them, and then stretch credulity to the utmost.

Mitch Gumabao (Dennis Roldan) who played the role of "the other man" in this movie was a newbie that time. When his sister Isabel Rivas was introduced by Gosiengfiao in one of his films, and since he was a good friend of mine, Mitch asked me whether I could Include him in Bedspacers. I told him that the cast has been finalized, and the remaining parts were those of the four rapists, a role that would not fit him since he looked so sweet and laid back. So I suggested that the best way to do it is to appear on TV drama first. So I wrote two episodes of ULILA where he played opposite Rosa Rosal and Fanny Serrano. Since I was already aware of the fact that even if an actor is a newbie, once that actor acted opposite Rosa Rosal, he's usually swayed by her acting prowess. This was exactly what happened to Mitch. His scenes with Rosa Rosal turned out really well. Lino Brocka saw his first two appearances in the TV drama and he didn't hesitate to include Mitch in his film.
I can't be sure now, but I think Salome is his second or third film, yet he showed so much promise. And his love scenes here with Gina Alajar were sizzling and hotter than Jalapeño :) especially since Laurice shot some of these scenes outdoors while the sun was shining so bright and you can almost feel the heat of the surroundings.
As usual, Johnny Delgado was fantastic here.

This film is one of my favorite Tagalog Films. It is intelligent, entertaining, also disturbing – something that pushes the envelope further, and the viewer has a lot think about after leaving the theater.

8 out of 10

Rodolfo Samonte said...

JM,
Your input are always so interesting, especially your one-on-one encounters with these showbiz personalities. Thanks. And thanks to you too, Simon for creating one of the most interesting blogs in the internet. Pasasalamat dahil Thanksgiving. Happy Thanksgiving to all bagama't it's an American Holiday.
Rod

Video 48 said...

Rod:
Happy Thanksgiving too!I heard they're giving out huge discounts.Happy shopping!

JM:
Again, thank you so much for your insightful views, sharing your thoughts, funny anecdotes, interesting escapades and experiences. It always make my day! Salamat!

LinkWithin

Blog Widget by LinkWithin