Out of all the entries in this year’s festival, Ani has the most promise.
It might be due to the fact that this futuristic themed movie could revolutionize the local movie industry because of its use of CGI. Or it might be because the people behind it have hyped it so much.
Coming out of the theater when the movie’s finished, I realized it’s because of the latter.
While it’s commendable for its efforts, Sandro del Rosario & Kim Zuñiga’s Ani fails to live up to the standards it set for itself. Its main selling point was that its advanced special effects. Although there are a couple of scenes where the CGI work is good. Ani, the robot, was also neatly done. But apart from those, it felt like CGI work for television episodes like Sineskwela. The effects were bordering on disappointing and it didn’t help that we were conditioned to expect jaw-dropping effects.
And it wasn’t the only letdown. The story was also unappealing. There were subplots that were irrelevant while some didn’t pay off. It might make you think if they were inserted in the script on a whim or if they served a real purpose and were just edited out of the story. There are moments that’ll make you scratch your head in confusion. Sometimes, in annoyance.
It wasn’t the movie we expected or wanted it to be. I would have loved to be jumping up and down for this but the overall presentation of the movie makes it hard for me to do.
The vision is there. The effort is evident. But there are moments, especially in filmmaking, when it’s not enough to be ambitious and you have to deliver.
Sad to say, Ani fails to even tell a coherent and compelling story. Its title doesn’t even make sense with the rest of the movie.
Image courtesy of Cinemalaya Institute
