Ang Pilipinas Ay Isang Malaking “Gracia ni Maria”

1. Ang Pilipinas ay isang malaking “Gracia ni Maria”. Trapped. This country is a huge maze. There is no way out. Hindi na alam kung paano makalabas sa samu’t saring kahirapan at kaguluhan dulot ng sistemang tanging naghaharing-uri lamang ang nakikinabang. That is, for me, the statement of the whole film.

2. Ang Pilipinas ay isang malaking “Gracia ni Maria.” Ironically, there is no genuine grace from the state.

3. Ang Pilipinas ay isang malaking “Gracia ni Maria.” Big fishes are protected by the crocodiles at the expense of the marginalized.

4. Ang Pilipinas ay isang malaking “Gracia ni Maria.” It’s life-threatening to be a Manigan in a world that is full of Judas. Traitors are everywhere.

5. Ang Pilipinas ay isang malaking “Gracia ni Maria.” Nanlaban ang suspek. Alam naman nating lahat kung sino ang tunay na kalaban.

6. Ang Pilipinas ay isang malaking “Gracia ni Maria.” War on drugs is not war on drugs. It is war against the poor, war against the small. We are fighting against the result, not the rootcause of the drug problem.

7. Ang Pilipinas ay isang malaking “Gracia ni Maria.” There is cemetery inside the compound. Tila ba araw-araw na naghihintay lamang ng casualties tutal ay normal naman sa maralitang lungsod.

8. Ang Pilipinas ay isang malaking “Gracia ni Maria.” “You are not the law”, sabi ng isang karakter. Ang sagot ko naman: The current administration is above the law.

9. Ang Pilipinas ay isang malaking “Gracia ni Maria.” I remember Benedict Anderson’s “Imagined Community.” Anderson posits that a nation is a socially constructed community, imagined by the people who perceive themselves as part of that group. Unfortunately, the ruling class owns the power to become selective who must be part of that group.

10. Ang Pilipinas ay isang malaking “Gracia ni Maria.” The last shot says it all. That Marxist-like imagery shows the dichotomies of society: superstructure and the base, bourgeoisie and the proletariat, the rich and the poor, the state and the civil society. Ang mga nasa ibaba ang laging talo.