Dalaw: A Movie Review

 

Because I love horror and suspense movies, it's a must for me to watch "Dalaw", one of the entries for 2010 Metro Manila Film Festival.

"Dalaw" is the story of Stella (Kris Aquino), a widow of four years whose violent husband died in a car accident while they were quarreling. She is now set to marry her high school sweetheart Anton (Diether Ocampo) with whom she has recently reconnected. From then however, Stella's life becomes a living hell when a mud-coated ghost haunts her dreams. After their wedding, the torment escalates as actual deaths began to occur among the people around her. Stella, with the help of a spooky neighbor with a "third eye" Aling Olga (Ms. Gina Pareno), needs to discover how to stop the malevolent terror from destroying her life.

My Likes: The movie is a combination of horror with a comic relief. I love the scenes when the suspense build up like when Stella is on the restroom and mud scattered the entire room. Another scene which made me frightened the unexpected appearance of Gina Pareño because she looks like Mrs. Ganush in "Drag Me To Hell". I also like the character of Gina Pareño wherein it was written and executed in a comic horror style. The classic movie lines made me laugh and forget that I'm watching a horror movie. Lastly, I also love the kissing scenes between Kris and Diet... naka-apat din si Kris na kiss sa lips from Diet ha... Hahaha!!!

My Dislikes: The start of the movie was a bit vague because Stella was being haunted by a mud ghost in her dreams, good thing the twist was revealed in the later part of the story. The movie was also shot using poor light. It seemed like most of the movie happened during the twilight to evening hours, which made a lot of scenes very hard to see.

Over-all Impression: I can say that this movie did not make a great impact unlike "Feng Shui" and "Sukob". If there is a rating and the highest is 5 stars... I would give it 3 1/2 stars.

I hope that the next horror movie of Kris Aquino would level to what "Feng Shui" and "Sukob" has achieved. Still, I can consider her as the "Queen of Philippine Horror Movies"... =)