RacsOview: Autohystoria (2007)

I remember seeing this way back in 2007 and felt too intrigued and sort of inspired by it. Raya Martin continues to show his uniqueness of vision and story telling, this time with a reimagination or restaging of the death of Andres Bonifacio. "Autohystoria", like I said is a different take on the last hours of Filipino hero Andres Bonifacio.

What was very different was that he used the camera this time as the third actor. The first part of the movie was like 30 minutes of some sort of surveillance, as the camera follows a guy walking on a street and enters his house. The second part wherein the same guy, now with a high school student, sitting in a taxi cab both seem to be behaving uneasily. The camera feels as though he was the one injecting the bad omen surrounding the two. The next scene we see the two guys, same guys from the cab, walking in a forest at midnight, I think. The camera now feels like he is governing the two and where they are going. Then the end, the inevitable death. Was the camera responsible for the death? Is he the killer?

What was so intriguing about this work is that there honestly is anything (I've seen) that is quite like it. Some may say that it is something Lav Diaz would make, but then again, is it really? I really think that the movie is Martin signature and he sure continues to show that and seems to be not losing his touch.

"Autohystoria" is commendable due to its freshness, originality and wit. I am now a convert. I love Martin's works and I am a big fan.