Life in a rat hole

Ataul for Rent is like a directory of who’s who in independent movies. With the exception of Jeffrey Quizon and Ryan Eigenmann (the top two digital films mainstays), it features anyone who matters in indies — from the queen, Irma Adlawan, to the empress, Jaclyn Jose.

It’s actually an all-star indie cast: Joel Torre, Noni Buencamino, Pen Medina, Ronnie Lazaro and even Masahista’s Coco Martin. (I guess he is the matinee idol of independent movies.)

One of the three Pinoy entries to the Montreal Film Festival (the other two are Brillante Mendoza’s Foster Child and Redd Ochoa’s Baliw), Ataul for Rent is set in a congested alleyway (actual location is off Kalayaan Road in the Makati-Taguig area) that harbors all the criminal elements of society: Hired killers, drug pushers/users, snatchers, gamblers, pimps and prostitutes. The list doesn’t include corrupt senators and congressmen because with all their pork barrel, why would they bother to live even near there?

The film is called Ataul for Rent because the people in that callejon are so poor (no criminal really gets rich, except if you’re in government), they couldn’t buy caskets for their dearly departed and could only afford to rent used ones — from the neighborhood funeral parlor of Joel Torre. (He is part of a package deal with his common-law wife, Jaclyn Jose, a makeup artist who prettifies dead bodies, while dabbing the same sponge she uses on her still very much alive clients — yuck!) Having coffins there also symbolizes what the people are like there — living dead since no hope awaits them. They, in fact, are dying one after the other — all at the same time even (to the glee of greedy funeral parlor owner Joel Torre because that means big business for him).

Ataul for Rent is directed by Neal “Buboy” Tan, who co-writes the script with Anthony Gedang (also the film’s executive producer). The name Neal “Buboy” Tan should be familiar to moviegoers patronizing sex flicks in the mid-‘90s. But even if he dabbled in that genre, I remember that his works were several notches above those of other directors who also did bold movies. I always thought he had much promise — given the right project.

And now he has Ataul for Rent, which was graded A by the Cinema Evaluation Board. The grimy callejon setting, of course, had been done many times before by the late Lino Brocka, but Neal “Buboy“ Tan gives the material a new twist by making it a satire (which was an Ishmael Bernal trademark).

His fresh ideas work beautifully because these were well-thought of and matched by the great talents of an all-indie assembly. Noni, Pen and Ronnie are reliable as always. Joel is once more exceptional. He is very effective as the heartless small-time businessman. Jaclyn merely breezes through her part, but you still relish in your mind her remarkable performance as Joel’s physically and emotionally-abused wife long after you’ve seen the film. Irma is given her big moment toward the end of the movie and it gives you the goose bumps witnessing such great acting talent unfold on the big screen. Even Tita Swarding as the pimp gives noteworthy performance in Ataul for Rent.

Like Brocka, Neal “Buboy” Tan is also an actor‘s director and this shows in his handling of newcomers Aleera Montalla and Irish Contreras as the prostitutes and Denver Olivares as Irma’s drug user/pusher son.

On the technical side, Neal “Buboy” Tan also has a masterful handling of each element and we see, hear and practically smell the stench of that hell on earth of a callejon. Even the boorish relatives of Remy, the lead rat character in Ratatouille would have thrown up in disgust at the sight of that filthy place — and even its population.

But it is in the truthful depiction of this rat hole inhabited by these people wasting their lives away that makes Ataul for Rent such a gem of a film.