“LATAY” (Battered Husband)
CAST OF CHARACTERS:
Allen Dizon • Lovi Poe • Snooky Serna • Soliman Cruz • Mariel De Leon • Adrian Cabido • Tabs Sumulong • Dianne Alvaro PRODUCTION STAFF:
Director – Ralston Gonzales Jover Executive Producer – Baby F. Go Producer – Baby Go, Dennis Evangelista & Ferdinand Lapuz Screenplay – Ralston Gonzales Jover Story – Dennis Evangelista & Ralston G. Jover Cinematographer – T.M. Malones Production Designer – Jay Custodio Film Editor – Jess Navarro Music – Diwa De Leon Sound – Junel Valencia
LOGLINE:
Can love be judged as doomed, by a stroke of betrayal that begs for forgiveness? A l len Dizon
Or
If love means to suffer to prove faith & humility, then why does it hurt as much as fighting for its righteousness?
SYNOPSIS:
Short:
Latay dwells into the brewing turmoil of an unusual rural couple, where the husband is the awkwardly “suffering” type, but vulnerable to temptation and passively lacks ambition and foresight. While the wife appears to be antagonistic, expressing discontent with the trials in their dysfunctional relationship via her violent streak, which unfortunately projects to her husband. It’s about a couple that has all the ideals of making love work ideally, but social forces coupled with their struggling egos, made them drift apart.
Long:
Lando, a laid-back fisherman, enjoys joining the yearly “Aguman Sanduk” fellowship cross-dressing festivity with his peers of Alpha males. Meanwhile, his mundane-everydaylife back in his isolated hut surrounded by fish pond waters, is beset with a horrifying secret about him being physically abused by his wife; and sometimes verbally degraded to no remorse whenever they have an argument.
Lando’s wife, Lori is due to leave for abroad as a domestic helper. She harbors ill-feelings against Lando whom she caught meeting up with his ex-girlfriend in a rendezvous. Her unusual violent streak becomes acceptably normal to Lando, who easily yields to his carnal guilt. In the last 2 days before she leaves for abroad, Lori and Lando sum up their irreconcilable differences as regrettably inconsolable. At Lori’s send off, Lando brews a best-laid-plan to settle their problem. While rowing a banca ride with Lori in their hometown’s desolate river, all his thoughts are about being with Laura forever despite her resistance. He’s so consumed with this romantic notion that he just stops rowing the boat and sets aside the paddle. He declares upon her disgust that he will either have her unconditionally or lose her to death according to his own violent terms. It doesn’t matter how bizarre his expression of love would mean by ending both their sufferings in vain.
DIRECTOR’S STATEMENT:
The production took more than a year before completion. We constantly monitored the looks and body built of the lead actors, to maintain continuity. The selfless commitment and professionalism of the actors, including that of the staff and crew’s, were just on point that everything went smooth as realized, when we resumed principal photography after a year.
The crossdressing festivity in the local town of Minalin, Pampanga, which is an hour’s drive north of Manila, has become the benchmark for the resumption of production. It was so spellbinding, over-the-top, and insanely creative festivity where real men enjoy dressing up in drag. Eventually, it became an ironic motif for the entire film that not just dwell on the sexual politics and atrocities between a dysfunctional couple trapped in a inconvenient marriage, but more importantly it underscores the social malaise of the sleepy-town-milieu, where more locals just want to escape poverty and find a better future abroad.
