‘Not courage, but love’: Missing activist film defies state ban

MANILA, Philippines – “We will defy [the ban],” filmmaker JL Burgos said on Saturday, August 24, as his documentary film Alipato at Muog finished screening at the University of the Philippines (UP) Film Center despite a public viewing ban.

The film, which is about the 17-year search for JL’s brother Jonas Burgos — a desaparecido, or victim of enforced disappearance — was given an X rating by the Movie and Television Review and Classification Board (MTRCB) for having the “tendency to undermine the faith and confidence of the people in their government.” According to MTRCB rules, an X rating means a ban on public viewing and television broadcast.

But the screening pushed through on Saturday at the packed film center of the UP, which is an autonomous institution. Director JL Burgos announced that two more screenings are scheduled on August 29 and 30 at the UP Film Center, the second day falling on the International Day of the Disappeared.

“Hindi siya tapang eh, kundi pagmamahal (It’s not courage, but love),” said Burgos matriarch Edita, who has become the face for all Filipino desaparecidos over the years of relentless campaign to surface her son and others. 

“Kayo po ang nagbigay sa amin ng lakas ng loob, na gawin ang dapat gawin, na gawin ang tama dahil ito ang tama (You gave us the courage to do what needs to be done, to do what’s right because it’s the right thing to do),” said Edita.

The film, which won this year’s Cinemalaya special jury prize, is an intimate portrait of the Burgos family from the point of view of JL, Jonas’ younger brother, with haunting animation that the director says shows what goes on inside his dreams (and nightmares) during their years of searching.

It also lays down documentary evidence, with backing interviews from campaigners, lawyers, and journalists, of the military’s link to Jonas’ abduction and disappearance. The film, taking off from a Newsbreak investigation, names then-general Eduardo Año as the chief of the army’s security group that was supposedly investigating one of their own for being a spy for communists, and which was apparently linked to Jonas’ abduction.

Año is now President Ferdinand Marcos Jr.’s security adviser. The National Security Council, which Año heads, had told the Agence France-Presse that the film “was a desperate attempt to revive an old case.”

“Enforced disappearance is a continuing crime, it means the crime is being committed up to this day,” JL said at a talkback after Saturday’s screening, citing the Anti-Enforced Disappearance Act.

“Ang mga takot sa pelikulang ito ay ang mga taong may kasalanan,” JL said. “Malinaw ang tinutukoy ng pelikula. Ganoon lang kasimple, ayaw nilang mapanuod ang tinutukoy ng pelikula (Those who fear the film are the people who are guilty…. The film has a clear message. It’s that simple, they don’t want people to know what the film wants to say).”

Jonas’ case reached the Supreme Court which found that both the military and the police “failed to conduct an exhaustive and meaningful investigation into the disappearance.” But the ruling was to order the Commission on Human Rights to probe further. The Court of Appeals went as far as naming a military major in its favorable writs ruling for Jonas’ family, but the Quezon City Regional Trial Court acquitted the officer in 2017 because the witness did not push through with his testimony.

The UP Film Center was packed on Saturday, which JL credits to organic word-of-mouth of early movie goers. JL said that aside from their Cinemalaya funding, he had loaned money to produce the film, which he has yet to pay off. This, he said, is what’s stopping him from uploading the movie to be streamed for free.

JL said he will exhaust all administrative remedies to appeal the X rating, which will culminate in an appeals committee. If that fails, JL said they are ready to go to court.

The internal rules of MTRCB’s charter, Presidential Decree No. 1986, says the board may disapprove a film on a number of grounds, including those “which tend to undermine the faith and confidence of the people in their government and/or the duly constituted authority.”

If it goes to court, it may be a precedent-setting case about the constitutional right to free speech, and the extent by which the state can regulate political speech. JL and Jonas are the sons of the late Malaya publisher Joe Burgos, a press freedom icon.

“This, I can assure you, hindi tayo aatras, lalaban tayo (we will not back down, we will fight),” said JL. – Rappler.com

Apart from Alipato at Muog, GMA News and Public Affairs’ documentary film Los Sabungeros — about the disappearance of cockfighters in 2022 — also had their screenings canceled by Cinemalaya due to “security concerns.” Ramona Diaz’s documentary film about Leni Robredo’s presidential campaign, And So It Begins, is currently not being shown on major cinema chains.