Shaina Akimah M.

Dipantar
English for Academic Purposes
Review Paper (Movie Review: Heneral Luna)

The text titled “Heneral Luna” by Jerrold Tarog

The movie “Heneral Luna” (lit. General Luna) is a 2015 Filipino historical biopic film
depicting General Antonio Luna's leadership of the Philippine Revolutionary Army during
the Philippine–American War. It opens with the beginning of hostilities with the American
colonizers, and ends with the assassination of Luna on June 5, 1899 - a period in which Luna
served as Supreme Chief of the Army under the First Philippine Republic. It opens with the
beginning of hostilities with the American colonizers, and ends with the assassination of Luna on
June 5, 1899 – a period in which Luna served as Supreme Chief of the Army under the First
Philippine Republic. It is a movie set during the American colonization of the Philippines. It is a
historical portrayal of the story of the revolutionary army’s commander, trained by Gerard Leman
for military warfare, is one of the Filipino generals who became exposed to the real essence of
becoming a true and brave soldier. General Luna imparts his knowledge from his mentor to his
soldiers. The movie shows that, although he is a man of courage and discipline, he knows how to
fool around sometimes, he knows how to play the guitar, and despite his prevalent attitude of
being too hardhearted, he knows how to respect women, most especially his mother. Just like
other people, he is imperfect. He has vices such as smoking and drinking.
This film is directed by Jerrold Tarog and produced by Artikulo Uno Productions. It was
released last September 9, 2015. The film received critical acclaim from critics and audiences
alike, praising its cinematography, writing, acting, and plot. The film was selected as the
Philippine entry for the Best Foreign Language Film at the 88th Academy Awards but it was not
nominated. With a production budget of 80 million pesos, it is one of the most expensive Filipino
epic historical film ever released. The film’s critical and commercial success spawned the sequel
Goyo: Ang Batang Heneral, which chronicles the life of the titular Gregorio Del Pilar during the
Philippine – American War.
Summary
The first scene which happened in a certain room, General Luna was alone with a boy
named Joven, who wanted to write a biography about the general. He asked him to tell the story
of life and the general reminded him jokingly that the biography might become a novel.
Then, it started in the meeting between the higher officials of the government. Of course,
President Emilio Aguinaldo and the Prime Minister of the Philippines, Apolinario Mabini were
present at the assembly. However, it was not a civil conversation among the members. They were
shouting at each other, debating on whether they should be trusting the Americans or not. It was
clear to the others that the foreign country was plotting something against their country.
However, there are some people that still sided with the Americans, saying that they were
trustworthy, unlike the Spaniards. Pedro Paterno was one them. Thus, useless arguments
erupted among them again and again.
“Para kayong mga birhen na naniniwala sa pag-ibig ng isang puta.” -one of Generel Luna’s
remarkable line during the discourse. The arrival of a messenger stopped the brawl momentarily,
sending a letter to the President which contained bad news. Yes, the inevitable happened. Some
soldiers scouting in Santa Mesa district, Manila were killed by the Americans and had terrorized
other places in the Philippines too.
After the leaders were stationed on the territories they must protect, General Luna with
his trusted comrades, Jose Alejandrino, Francisco “Paco” Roman, Eduardo Rusca, Jose Bernal,
and Manuel Bernal had a battle with the Americans in Intramuros. Their enemies were well -
equipped and trained, so they had to request reinforcements from the Kawit Brigade. But Captain
Pedro Janolino was irritated with the general’s bossy attitude so, he refused to follow his orders.
Luna was so annoyed with his lack of cooperation so, he stomped into the hut the captain was
in, who was sleeping beside a naked woman, and dragged him outside to humiliate him in front
of his soldiers. Janolino reported the general’s wicked deed to the president, but Mabini
counseled Aguinaldo to let it pass.
The country was at war, but the pathetic cabinet members were still arguing about
deepening the relationship of Americans and Filipinos. Felipe Buencamino was pressing on
trusting them, which earned him an arrest from General Luna, who was flamed by his lies.
President Aguinaldo was aware that the other members are getting fed up of the Luna’s attitude.
Luna also fought with General Mascardo because he was spewing insults at his co-general, who
refused to accept that he had a son in the war who chickened out.
Then, General Luna was rumored by a telegram written by the President that asked him
to show up in Cabanatuan. When he arrived, he was welcomed by the silence of the place.
Strangely there’s only a few people around. Felipe Buencamino was the only one present in the
office and he told him that the President left long ago before he arrived. When he heard a
gunshot outside, he went out in order to punish the soldier who did it. In the ambush, the General
was fired and stabbed to death. In the ending, Felipe, Aguinaldo, and Joven were explaining their
sides of the story. General Luna’s demise left a lot of questions unanswered.
Analysis
The fiery general set out during the Philippine American an unbridled General Antonio
Luna faced a much more formidable for than the American army: his own treacherous and
gullible countrymen.
After 300 years ago of being a Spanish colony, the general grew exasperated having to
put up with the nation’s submissiveness to foreigners unwillingly handed to the Americans, the
general never thought twice to fight for the country’s independence once again. But tensions
built up between the members of the cabinet when some of them deliberated striking a deal with
their invaders for they believed the American had good intentions for the Philippines.
General Antonio Luna and his loyal men were outraged and accused the other members
of the cabinet traitors and disloyal to the country. He continued to wage war with the Americans
even when his military decisions were largely ignored by the soldiers who were only loyal to the
President.
In the events that led the film to its conclusion, the general’s legendary temper and
spitefulness brought him to his death, when he was assassinated by a group of soldiers in a
convent in Cabanatuan on June 5, 1899. The mystery behind the General’s assassination has
never been solved, and the killers and mastermind were never put to justice.
The popularization of an unfamiliar Filipino hero brings us a great film that is worth
watching today, which begins with a contextualization of the flow of events during the early years
of the insurgency. Hot-headed and spiteful General Antonio Luna has never before been
humanized as when he was written in Filipino history books. Filipino filmmakers have settled
down into making cliché and cheesy romantic movie because of its everlasting trend in the
Philippines, but a film like this indeed takes a massive leap from the norm.
Focusing on the characters, John Arcilla’s portrayal of the fiery General Antonio Luna gave
us a peek of what he was like as a leader and as an advocate of the Filipino nation. His character
was consistent until the end, depicting his temperamental personality and his stubbornness until
his last breath.
The film does not only focus on General Luna character. The President was notable in his
attempt to demonstrate neutrality and being all ears to his cabinet members during heated
discussions. But behind this, he was genuinely insecure and worrisome about his position as the
leader of the Philippine Republic, that maybe General Luna might overthrow and replace his
place.
While there is warning that the film was a contextualization of the military life of the
General in the Philippine-American War, it is just an assertion that fictionalizing history is
sometimes necessary to reach far more critical truths than what the objectified versions of
history say. Its film is as equally advantageous in narrating, expressing, and capturing
experiences, ideas, and emotions as a book is, but one thing a book cannot do is provide readily-
visual information that we can easily take in for a shorter amount of time. Despite the lyrical
dialogues that may have never been uttered in real life by General Antonio Luna and our other
past leaders, the film has successfully depicted significant events that are part of Philippine
history. It is still indeed an excellent historical resource for both historian and ordinary people
alike.
Opinion
The movie a satisfying mainstream historical film that has not been seen in years. No
words can describe my satisfaction with this film and the only way to review it is through personal
experience. There are pacing problems and disappointments in terms of the props such as the
weaponry used by both sides, but given the film's tight budget, it has managed to portray these
battle scenes with epic proportions combined with the score being obviously inspired by the
Russian composer Igor Stravinsky. The atmosphere of the entire film is portrayed beautifully, it
shows the political machinations and political infighting when the battle scenes are not present,
for the entire point of view is based upon Luna and his allies. Still, if you are either a history buff
or just an average movie goer, this film is spectacular and it deserves to be one the best films of
the year if there are any formal awards as such.
It also exceeds the expectation of the viewers. General Luna opens claiming that this is a
fictionalized biopic of one of Philippine's most important historical figures, Antonio Luna, for the
sake of getting the modern audience into the history's bigger picture. In spite of being more
intense and surprisingly humorous, the movie stays loyal to what this figure truly stands for. The
war is brutal, over-the-top to bring up for visual flare, and their serious situations being often
treated as sincere satires. How the film executed these ideas are just brilliant, it gets larger-than-
life without feeling weird, towards the heart of defending the nation worth fighting for.
The film is very stylish, creative and well thought by the director and other production
staff. The notorious, bad-ass, and famous Gen. Antonio Luna was portrayed in the big screen that
will make each Pilipino proud. This was one of the most outstanding performance for all of the
actors involving in this film, well directed by Jerrold Tarog, and the cinematography and set pieces
were jaw-dropping. The creativity and style in the part of the film where Gen. Luna closed his
eyes while talking with his mother and reminisced the past days with their family and the past
events that occurred in their lives and the people around them was astonishing.
It is also worth it to watch, all your time and efforts in watching will not be wasted. The
movie, character, plot, setting, climax is perfect. The movie is not trying hard and it is very
entertaining to watch. There aren’t many effects and most of the shots are done manually, their
characters are balanced and performed well throughout the movie. It shows the humane side of
Heneral Luna (Gen.Luna) how his passion and love for the country evolved during his time.
Conclusion
From the start, I agreed that the movie Heneral Luna is worth seeing at least once. It
represents something out of the ordinary for Philippine Cinema, if you know what I mean. On the
other hand, I couldn’t really relate to all the praise it was getting. I don’t believe the film is bad;
it’s just that, to quote a review I saw on the Internet, I felt the movie had a “kitchen sink” feel to
it. It was trying to do and be too many things at one time. Perhaps, as an example, the timing of
the comic relief didn’t work for me; I was left wondering saan kaya gusto nila patungoin (what
direction do they want to take with it?), or “where did that come from?”. Nevertheless, I maintain
that Heneral Luna is still worth the price of admission because it did relatively well either or both
of the things that a good movie should: stir one’s emotions or make one think. It did the latter.
Compared to the likes of Jose Rizal, Andres Bonifacio, et al., Antonio Luna is for most Filipinos a
relatively obscure figure. Yet the role he played in the fight for independence cannot be ignored.
History, however, seems a tough subject to tackle in a film, in the sense that keeping it
interesting is a big challenge. For most of us, we relegate it to a subject in school that we have to
pass. We could even say that history is something a lot of us are either stuck in, or are only trying
too hard to forget. We cannot deny, however, that history is only too vital, because those who
don’t learn from it are doomed to repeat it. Perhaps through calculated timing, or through the
sheer natural flow of events, the themes depicted in the movie resonate with more moviegoers.
More and more Filipinos are becoming disillusioned and dissatisfied with the way things are in
this country. The politicking, the provincialism and pettiness of Filipinos were depicted as existing
even as far back as those times, the start of the 20th century.
If you’ve already watched the film, and you come out of it hating Emilio Aguinaldo more,
or admiring Antonio Luna for what he is, I think that is only one part of a bigger picture. It may
even be missing the bigger point. The point is, our history is replete with lessons about ourselves;
lessons, that apparently, we have yet to apply, lessons that we deny or ignore. The deeper ills
that were supposedly present in our society back then are the same ones that we are still facing
now. The times have changed; the dysfunction has not. If you’ve already watched the film, and
you come out of it hating Emilio Aguinaldo more, or admiring Antonio Luna for what he is, I think
that is only one part of a bigger picture. It may even be missing the bigger point. The point is, our
history is replete with lessons about ourselves; lessons, that apparently, we have yet to apply,
lessons that we deny or ignore. The deeper ills that were supposedly present in our society back
then are the same ones that we are still facing now. The times have changed; the dysfunction has
not. Change is something Filipinos need drastically. Both in real life and on the reel. I can only
say, in conclusion, that it is a fitting thing to think about for the Heneral Luna movie.