Now and then

At the height of the QCinema run in November 2023, my blog partner and cousin, Noli Agbayani Manaig, died due to cancer. I was devastated and forsook watching festival films.

I looked back at his old blog posts. I then remembered how we collaborated on this film blog in 2009. During a lull in a birthday party proceedings, I went up to his room and browsed through his collection of film books and DVDs. We discussed a few films and then he blurted out about wanting to write about films. I told him that I had a blog. I showed him my pedestrian posts. Surprisingly, he proposed that we create a new blog.

Noli, an English Studies grad from UP Diliman, wrote beautifully worded movie reviews and insightful film criticisms. He was well-versed in world cinema. He was passionate in sharing his opinions on must-see films. I loved it when he peppered his writings with anecdotes of life in our hometown of Bayombong, Nueva Vizcaya.

Noli envied my knowledge of local film classics. Slowly, he soaked up on local movies. He doggedly followed film festivals. Eventually, he surpassed my passion for local films. He was no longer merely writing about films, he was creating them! 

Every year, I look forward to the CCP Gawad Alternatibo video competition. The short film entries are sometimes more interesting than the Cinemalaya set of shorts. Noli submitted some of the best shorts I've seen in the last 3 years. He won a handful of awards from the Gawad Alternatibo competition. 

Noli was elated when I did a favorable review of the film Pisay. Noli was a Philippine Science High School grad and had ambivalent feelings about the film. I knew a handful of grads personally and I think the film captured them and the zeitgeist perfectly. There was a film character who took up non-science course in college. Yup, that happened to Noli. Then, there was this film character who bragged about his Carlos Palanca awards. Noli also won a Carlos Palanca award for his poetry in English in 2014.

I miss you, cousin Noli. Thank you for the precious blog posts and blogs. Thank you for the wondrous short films. Thank you for the awesome book The God Botherers. Thank you for lending me your original DVDs and also the Dibidi ones. Thank you for your critiquing and writing tips. Thank you for giving me oodles of film books.

I might revisit film blogging again if the mood strikes me. I've since gone back to watching films in theaters. And, with every film, I remember you. 

I'll remember you. Now and then.

-- Reonel Jose Costales