Tikoy’s unfulfilled dreams

We first met Amable Aguiluz VI (better known as Tikoy Aguiluz) through poetess Virginia Moreno, in her café, where she held poetry readings, film showings of European classics and soirees. Coming from a family of businessmen, Tikoy was being groomed to become anything but a director. He eventually took up Fine Arts and Comparative Literature. Tikoy remembers Lino Brocka shoving him to work on the film Maynila Sa Mga Kuko ng Liwanag for producer-cinematographer Mike de Leon, hauling cables and getting electrocuted by technicians pulling pranks.

He desperately wanted to quit but his passion for cinema prevailed and he finished a documentary, Mt. Banahaw, Holy Mountain (1976) which  became his ticket to the world. Banahaw earned him the Silver trophy at the Young Filmmakers of Asia Festival. Lax censorship rules to pacify general unrest of the times heralded the “Bomba” era of the ’70s to ’80s. Tikoy’s The Boatman, a picture of live sex performers, was shown at the Manila Film Center of First Lady Imelda Marcos. It highlighted the repressive and miserable conditions during the Marcos era. The film was brilliantly directed with a raw, uncompromising, sexually explicit look that caused its lead Ronnie Lazaro to swear never ever to come within shouting distance of his director again.

Boatman has been described to be the first sex film to truly raise itself to the level of art.” Not long after, Tikoy saw the opportunity of having domestic films infiltrate the international market through co-productions, and to bring back what was to have been the blueprint of the ill-fated Manila International Film Festival of Imelda Marcos. It was in 1999 that CineManila opened the gates of Philippine cinema to the world. Rizal Sa Dapitan (Rizal in Dapitan, 1977), his take on the exile of National Hero Jose Rizal, was among the best of the many Rizal films on the landscape. It was a favorite among award-giving bodies that year, winning the Gatpuno Antonio J. Villegas from Urian, Centennial Award from FAMAS and two Best Director trophies from FAMAS and Star Awards, among others. Rizal Sa Dapitan also confirmed Tikoy’s inclination towards stories of heroism. His earlier film Bagong Bayani (A New Hero, 1995) dissects the controversial case of Flor Contemplacion convicted of murdering a fellow overseas worker.

The handful of films Tikoy has made includes stories of doom, danger and helplessness as that of a wayward gambler running off with a marked man in Biyaheng Langit (Journey to Heaven, 2000) and www.XXX.com (2003), exposing the profligate life of a webcam prostitute. However, it was his earlier Segurista (Playing Safe, 1996), on the double life of an insurance agent and Guest Relations Officer (another term for hostess at a club) that would astound critics. The film’s tragic end leaves a hauntingly bitter taste in the mouth. MTRCB rated the movie with an X (not to be exhibited), only to be later chosen by the Film Academy of the Philippines as the country’s entry to the Oscar’s.

The above is an abridged version of the author’s book titled Filipino Directors Up Close published by Anvil Publishing in 2010. 

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