‘This restoration of “Bona” shows how concerned individuals across the world are united by passion to preserve film heritage.’
BY GAY ACE DOMINGO
This year’s Cannes International Film Festival is another banner year for Philippine cinema as the digitally restored version of “Bona,” a film starring National Artist Nora Aunor and produced by the superstar herself, is screening in the A-list film festival.
The 1980 classic directed by National Artist Lino Brocka and written by Cenen Ramones is a story of a fan, Bona (played by Nora), who leaves her comfortable life to become the personal assistant of Gardo, a bit player whom she is infatuated with.
Film scholars described the drama as one of Brocka’s best, and one of the most iconic Filipino films. It won for Nora a Best Actress award from the Gawad Urian, and was shown in the 1981 Cannes International Film Festival Director’s Fortnight. In 2012, it was adapted for stage by PETA with Eugene Domingo and Edgar Allan Guzman in the lead roles.
The road to the restoration of “Bona,” the film, began sometime in 2017 when JB Capino, a Filipino film professor based in the US, interviewed French director and Asian cinema advocate Pierre Rissient (who, according to the Internet Movie Data Base, was also an assistant director in Jean Luc-Godard’s “Breathless”).
JB had been working on his book on Brocka in 2017. JB told Malaya Business Insight, “Pierre played a crucial role in getting Brocka’s work accepted to Cannes. He was very close to the festival director at that time and lobbied for Asian films and films from the Global South to play at the festival.”
Rissient entrusted JB with information about the prints of “Bona” and “Jaguar,” another Brocka movie. “He told me where to find the ‘masters’,” JB said of Rissient. “Geek that I am, tears welled in my eyes. He was visibly moved, too, and we had a good chuckle.”
In 2018, after Rissient passed away, JB shared the information to Kani Releasing, a movie production and distribution company that promotes Asian cinema in North America. What followed was years-long journey that involved JB, Kani Releasing, French distribution company Carlotta Films, and producer-star Nora. “It’s been a process of a little over three years, from tracking down the rights and the elements, to meeting Nora Aunor, to the final version restored in France. It’s been very fulfilling,” Kani Releasing’s Ariel Esteban Cayer told Malaya Business Insight in an email interview.
Ariel’s company is a big supporter of Filipino cinema. “We are passionate about releasing Filipino cinema… and our second release was the ABS-CBN restoration of Lino Brocka’s ‘Cain and Abel’ (which Carlotta Films also distributed in France).”
Ariel also shared that Brocka’s films had gained renown among cineastes in the US and this fact was not lost on them. He said, “We love Brocka’s work, which we first discovered, as many in North America, through the excellent restorations of ‘Insiang’ and ‘Manila in the Claws of Light,’ shepherded by Martin Scorsese’s The Film Foundation and later released in North America by Janus Films/Criterion. It is was our intention to keep the ball rolling, so to speak, and to make sure that more of Brocka’s films get restored and re-released both abroad and in the Philippines.”
For the digitally restored “Bona,” the original 35mm camera and sound negatives were scanned, restored and color graded in 4K resolution by Cité de Mémoire labs in Paris, with the sound restoration handled by L.E. DIAPASON. Furthermore, the proponents commissioned Filipino filmmaker Dodo Dayao to create the English subtitles.
Ariel is very proud of the result, which he described as truly befitting of the director and the star behind it. He said, “It’s as close as seeing the film for the first time, at its first showing in 1981… likely better! Most important to fans and scholars of Brocka’s work, it is incomparable to versions of the film currently in circulation: murky VHS or DVD copies sourced from exhibition prints. It’s cliché, but it truly felt like seeing the film for the first time. We were able to appreciate it for what it is, which is to say: one of Brocka’s and Nora Aunor’s many masterpieces. We’re also proud of the new subtitle translation by Dodo Dayao.”
Kani Releasing is planning to have “Bona” shown at different film festival. A theatrical release is being eyed in late 2024, with a home video release by early 2025. Carlotta Films will be spearheading the cinema release in France in September.
Screenings in the Philippines and Asia are also in the works.
This restoration of “Bona” shows how concerned individuals across the world are united by passion to preserve film heritage. Without this, we would all still be stuck with copies of “Bona” that are “muddy, dark VHZ fuzz with inaccurate colors and burnt-in subtitles.”
As JB declared, “It’s so great that foreigners recognize the value of Brocka’s work and have spent their own dime on restoring one of his best films. The fact that pristine visual elements were preserved over the years is a small miracle.”
“Bona” is included in the Cannes Classics section of 77th edition of the Cannes International Film Festival, which will run from May 14 to 25, 2024.
