By Pennie Azarcon-dela Cruz, Executive Editor
Sunday Inquirer Magazine

REMEMBER that old saw about making sure you’re not hungry when you go shopping? Well, my corollary to that is, never never watch “Eat Drink Man Woman” when you haven’t had a meal.

The first time I caught this Ang Lee movie on late TV was way past dinner, so that by the end of the opening scene where this longtime widower is shown filleting fish, blanching vegetables, chopping squid, delicately twisting siomao wrappers and deep frying the Peking duck that he had just blown up like a balloon, I felt like licking the TV screen, drooling desperately for some Chinese food.

How can you resist such a tempting premise? You know that the deft slicing, chopping and kneading of meat, vegetables and dough are a prelude to something even better. Like the isolated notes on a music sheet, you just know there’s a symphony waiting to float out into the air once those notes are strung together on an instrument. The promise of several sumptuous dishes are evident behind all that steam and sizzle and in the furrowed brow concentration that the aging Chinese chef invests on his kitchen labor.

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By Ruel S. De Vera, Associate Editor
Sunday Inquirer Magazine

WHENEVER I ask people what their all-time favorite movie is, they will invariably respond with “There’s just too many.” Now, despite the clarity of my request and the frustration I feel whenever someone can’t give a simple answer, I actually completely understand this feeling. Our favorite movies are so important to us that to name one haphazardly feels unfair not only to that movie but to the other movies which might have been overlooked.

So let us change the question. If you were a movie, which one would you be? Now there’s a compelling quandary.

I’d like to think of myself as a biopic, like one of those movies where a damaged person overcomes everything somehow, like “A Beautiful Mind” or “Seabiscuit” (yes, he’s a horse, I know that). Sometimes I’d like to think of myself as someone overflowing with snarky dialogue and observations, like “Juno” or even “Iron Man.” I’d like to imagine I have a powerful sense of wonder, like “Finding Neverland” or “Shakespeare in Love.”

Luckily, my all-time favorite movie remains the one I identify with closest. The Wachowski brothers’ masterpiece “The Matrix” has received many brickbats, most having to do with its (in my mind, underrated but certainly) inferior sequels. But the core of the Matrix, about choosing to wake up even if the dream is bliss, of fighting back when you discover the deception, especially when others decide to go on with the subterfuge, is so authentic, the movie still matters. It’s a remix of so many elements (comic books, cyberpunk, anime), all of which I love, but it’s also about choosing to be an individual, not just different, amid a world of sameness. That’s something I can really believe in, a pill I’m most willing to swallow.

For more on movies — memorable movie lines, the Filipino as moviegover and great Pinoy moments in global cinema — check out the June 1 issue of the Sunday Inquirer Magazine.