Kisapmata (Filipino for "(in the) blink of an eye") is a 1981 Filipino psychological horror drama film directed by Mike de Leon from a screenplay he co-wrote with Clodualdo del Mundo Jr. and Raquel Villavicencio. It stars Vic Silayan, Charo Santos, Jay Ilagan, and Charito Solis. The plot was inspired by the crime reportage "The House on Zapote Street" written by Nick Joaquin. The piece chronicles the events leading to the highly publicized familicide committed by Pablo Cabading, a retired policeman.
Considered as a pioneer of the psychological horror film genre in the Philippines, its subject matter and themes, especially drawing inspirations and parallels from true crime stories, marked the first major treatment of incest in Philippine cinema, while its message has been viewed as a commentary against the patriarchy and the regime of then-President Ferdinand Marcos.
The film premiered at the 7th Metro Manila Film Festival. Despite receiving controversy upon release, the film received critical acclaim, establishing de Leon as one of the great directors of the new generation of Filipino filmmakers. The film won ten awards from the festival, including Best Film, and was subsequently screened at the 35th Cannes Film Festival during the Directors' Fortnight, alongside de Leon's Batch '81.
Often regarded as one of the greatest Filipino films ever made in retrospective years, the Manunuri ng Pelikulang Pilipino (Filipino Film Critics) included Kisapmata in their list of Ten Best Films of the Decade and was voted the 3rd best Filipino film of all time (behind Manila in the Claws of Light and Himala, respectively) in a 2013 poll organized by Pinoy Rebyu. In 2020, the film was digitally restored with a subsequent theatrical screening at the 34th Il Cinema Ritrovato in Bologna, Italy.
Plot Mila reluctantly tells her domineering father Tatang Dadong Carandang, a retired policeman, that she is pregnant. Mila asks permission from her father to marry her co-worker Noel Manalansan. Dadong begrudgingly gives his permission when his unreasonable demands for a hefty dowry are met.
After the wedding, Dadong insists that the newlyweds stay in his house. Despite protestations, the young couple acquiesce. During their time living in the Carandang house, Mila tells Noel that she must stay with her sick mother Dely, much to Noel's annoyance as he wants to move out with Mila as soon as possible. One evening, Noel is forced to find other accommodations after he is locked out of the house.
Although still fearful of her father, Mila decides to escape. She and Noel stay with Noel's father. The young couple, however, return to the Carandang house to gather their belongings. Dadong pleads with Mila to stay, saying he has an interest in the baby she is carrying (suggesting that he has been carrying on an incestuous relationship with his daughter). As Mila and Noel stand firm on leaving, a depressed Dadong pulls out his gun, and shoots Dely, Noel, Mila, and finally himself.
Cast
Although the original film credits had Solis's and Santos's characters as Adelina and Milagros Carandang, de Leon clarified upon the release of the restored version that their characters' names were Dely and Mila respectively. Silayan's character is simply Tatong Dadong. Additionally, the last name Carandang is never mentioned in the film.
Production
Inspiration The film was inspired by The House on Zapote Street: The Curious Drama Behind the Massacre Last Week in Makati, written by Nick Joaquin under the pen name Quijano de Manila. The report was first published in the Philippine Free Press on January 28, 1961, and was later included in Joaquin's collection Reportage on Crime: Thirteen Horror Happenings that Hit the Headlines, published in 1977. Joaquin's piece chronicles the familicide committed by retired police detective Pablo Cabading. Divided into six "episodes," it is written in the New Journalism style, based on the journalist's own primary research and investigation, including witness interviews.
On January 18, 1961, Cabading shot his daughter, Lydia Cabading-Quitangon, and his son-in-law, Leonardo, both of whom were medical doctors. After killing the newly-weds, Cabading shot himself. His wife, Asuncion, survived and would later attempt to stop the release of the film.
Joaquin's reportage is silent about any rape that may have been committed by the father but academic Joyce Arriola states that "the text suggests that possibility." De Leon was also influenced by the 1978 novel Blood Secrets by Craig Jones, which further developed the theme of incest.
The original version of the film omits Joaquin's name. According to de Leon, this was because the film's producers were seeking to avoid explicit reference to the real case. In the restored copy, the journalist is credited.
Development After the release of Kung Mangarap Ka't Magising, de Leon was interested in adapting a story based on real events, writing in his memoir, "Countless true stories are waiting to be filmed. So why would I settle for fiction?" According to the director, in the 1970s, he was approached by the brother of one of the convicted perpetrators of the rape of Maggie de la Riva to make a movie about the crime. Although there had been several meetings, the project did not push through. The case was later dramatized in a 1994 film.
De Leon was also interested in adapting Joaquin's article as early as 1978 but experienced difficulty in finding a producer who was willing to back a film with such dark themes. He was later approached by producer Jackie Atienza who was interested in de Leon replicating the mood of de Leon's directorial debut Itim. They discussed adapting the novel Blood Secrets but eventually settled on Joaquin's article.
Writing The screenplay was written by de Leon, Clodualdo del Mundo, Jr., and Raquel Villavicencio. The trio had previously worked together co-writing the 1980 musical Kakabakaba Ka Ba? and the then-on-production-hiatus Batch '81. Their co-writing process started with group discussions, followed by del Mundo and Villavicencio writing separate scenes that de Leon would make a composite from. With that as their first draft, they would continue building on it together. Back in 1978, Villavicencio answered a newspaper ad and participated in de Leon and del Mundo's first and only LVN Filmmaking Workshop.
During the writing process and even after most of the film had finished shooting, de Leon was not satisfied with the endings proposed. He re-read the broadsheet coverage of the crime as well as Joaquin's reportage. Instead of any dramatic confrontations, it came to de Leon that the ending happens "in the blink of an eye," and so the abruptness was replicated in the film.
In order to avoid lawsuits, the names of the people in Joaquin's report were changed from the Cabading family to the Carandang family, as well as the profession of the young couple from doctors to accountants. The timeline of the film was also changed from 1961 to 1981, the production year. Beyond the Joaquin article, De Leon did original research on the crime, uncovering details that were never released to the public, including the fact that the father hid under the young couple's bed while they were sleeping, that the father had two wives, and that after he had shot the others, the father laid down on his daughter's bed before shooting himself, although these were not incorporated into the film. Vic Silayan, who plays Dadong Carandang, had asked de Leon if the character could be changed to a step-father as he was uncomfortable with the incest issue, but they both acknowledged it would ultimately change the film.
Pre-production and filming
The film was shot while production on de Leon's Batch '81 was on hiatus due to budget problems. In May 1981, four months into principal photography for Batch '81, its producer, Marichu Maceda, announced that filming would have to pause. Maceda's other production, Pakawalan Mo Ako starring Vilma Santos, was behind schedule and financing two films simultaneously was too expensive. Production on Batch '81 continued three months later; by that time de Leon and his creative team had filmed Kisapmata.
Production designer Cesar Hernando had come across the house while looking for a location to film the riot scene of Batch '81. Hernando recalled coming across the house for rent that was "eerily similar in structure to the original house on Zapote Street." It was rented for two months. The set was ready in three weeks, in which time Hernando and art director Lea Locsin remodeled it and added borrowed furniture to work around their tight budget. De Leon called Kisapmata "Cesar's best work among my films."
Shooting lasted 18 days. Actress Charo Santos both acted in and worked as a line producer on set. Santos made her acting debut in de Leon's 1976 film Itim and also starred in his 1980 film Kakabakaba Ka Ba?. She would go on to produce such films as Peque Gallaga's Oro, Plata, Mata and Ishmael Bernal's Himala before becoming the president and chief executive officer of ABS-CBN Corporation.
Actor Silayan recalled that for most films at the time he was not given a script beforehand and thus found his film acting shallower than what he was able to convey on stage. It was only on Kisapmata and Marilou Diaz-Abaya's 1983 film Of the Flesh where he was given a script before shooting and thus able to add depth to the characters. On the character, Silayan said, "I don't think it was just authoritarian. It was insane possession."
Post-production
Deleted scene A black-and-white dream sequence was filmed although it was removed in editing. As keeping deleted scenes was not the practice in the Philippines at the time of production, the footage was thrown away. Several photos of the deleted scene have survived. In the dream, the bank where Mila and Noel work is turned into a hospital, with Mila on a gurney being wheeled by Noel into the bank vault. Throughout the bank, the tellers are dressed as nurses with crucifixes in front of them. Noel shoots Mila, but instead of a bullet it is blood that is released from the gun. On the deleted scene, de Leon said, "I decided that the dream sequence was over the top and had no place in the film."
Censored scene Due to its controversial theme, only subtle references to incest are used throughout the film. Nevertheless, Kisapmata was subjected to the Board of Censors for Motion Pictures, then headed by Senator Maria Kalaw Katigbak, who required de Leon to remove a scene where the father enters his daughter's room as she fearfully waits for him to come in. Katigbak told de Leon that the scene "showed him [the father] in an aroused state," to which the director, although complying with the demand, disagreed.
Academic Nicanor Tiongson found that as a result "the point of the scene – the horror of incest – was obscured."
De Leon and the film's editor Jess Navarro were able to save the negatives of the scene by making a duplicate and spliciting it into a reel of negative out cuts from another film. The scene was re-added for the screening at the Cannes Film Festival. De Leon has referred to the Metro Manila Film Festival copy as the "theatrical version" and the Cannes Film Festival copy as the "final cut."
Themes and symbols
Kisapmata is generally viewed as an allegory of the dictatorial regime of then President Ferdinand Marcos, a theme director Mike de Leon explores in his films Batch '81 and Sister Stella L. Academic Nicanor Tiongson found the violent and unreasonable relationship of Dadong Carandang, the over-possessive father, with Mila, his incest victim, as a microcosm of Marcos' rule. Released on the year that martial law was lifted, during a time of growing political upheaval, the desperation and breakdown of the father as his daughter slips away subtly points towards the fragile condition of the Philippine nation.
Carandang house