Film Review: Layang Bilanggo, a film by Michael Angelo Dagnalan

by Raymond Golez

"Layang Bilanggo" -- Official Film Poster

This film has a two storyline playing alongside each other. The illusion is cleverly maintained and brilliantly hatched. At first, it would make you guess if it classifies as “medias res” or a “flashback” type of film plot, but the twist is somehow amazing!

There is much to admire in the early goings of Layang Bilanggo. The first 10 or so minutes are a study in storytelling restraint and concision, an opening sequence that redounds to great directorial promise. First, we are given to witness an assassin’s pinpoint precision as he executes a hit. The film then cuts to a jail office where a journalist and the chief warden discuss rumors of prisoner-assassins. The warden hems and haws, clearly concealing the truth. Subsequently, we get the assassin’s vantage, his double life in prison… In a few precise and penetrating scenes that reflect and lay bare the urgency of what it dramatizes, the film sets up an absorbing premise and introduces the disturbing reality of the “prisoner-for-hire”.

“Prisoner-for-hire“. That criminal mutation born out of extreme state impunity and corruption, on the payroll and protection of penitentiaries that are supposed to reform him. In Mike Dagñalan’s sophomore film, the focus falls on one such assassin named Paul, a man who is caught on the horns of a dilemma. He wants to turn his life around, but he is helpless. For him, there is no exit: middle-aged and all, he must keep on killing to remain useful to his sponsors, to whom the diminishment of his abilities might spell expendability. Death. His is a cheapened life whose fate is not his to decide.

Upon the conclusion of the film, I was in awe on the outcome of the story. Speechless. Amazed.

I believe, if this film would receive 100% support from the government and the mainstream film industry, it will definitely have the chance to make it to the Oscars. The story was unique and the plot was so remarkable. If you want to learn more on the issues about “Prisoners for Hire”, this film is a must-see! No wonder it won Best Picture at the recently concluded 6th CinemaOne Originals Digital Film Festival.

“Treat our aged parents as you would wish to be treated…Love them greatly in memory of me…” – DR. JOSE RIZAL (December 30, 1896)

Awards:

6th CINEMA ONE ORIGINALS DIGITAL FILM FESTIVAL

– BEST PICTURE

– BEST DIRECTOR

– BEST SCREENPLAY

– BEST ACTOR

With the director of Layang Bilanggo, Michael Angelo Dagnalan