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Calling something The Disappearance of Eleanor Rigby naturally raises questions.
– When will she pick up the rice in the church where a wedding has been?
– Does she keep her face in a jar by the door?
– Does he darn his socks in the night when there’s nobody there?

We’re watching this anyway.

Movie #61: Noah by Darren Aronofsky. Don’t think of it as a tale from the Old Testament, think of it as a bizarre origin story with pretty boys in skinny jeans and ancient Transformers.

Transformers 4: Age of Extinction is the latest installment in a blockbuster series about cars and trucks that turn into giant robots from outer space. If you expect it to make sense, you’re insane. Plus it’s directed by Michael Bay. All Michael Bay movies are about his (redacted because Transformers 4 is for General Patronage).

True, the movie might have seemed more rational if I could remember what happened in Transformers 3, but all I recall is chaos, explosions, and hardware. Which pretty much sums up the entire Transformers movie franchise. Confessions: I really enjoyed the first one, and applauded when the evil one announced, “I…am…Megatron!” Imagine my disappointment when Megatron turned up in a subsequent episode wearing a very large scarf apparently borrowed from Rita Gomez, accompanied by a noisy bird. I also prepared my tear ducts in expectation of the moment in the cartoons where Optimus Prime dies. In the second movie he died for about two minutes then is revived…because it’s a movie.

Read our review at InterAksyon.com.

We prefer that title to the rather generic Edge of Tomorrow or even Groundhog Day In War With Aliens. Still, we enjoyed Edge of Tomorrow to little pieces and we’re curious to see how different it is from its source, the Japanese science-fiction work. All You Need Is Kill by Hiroshi Sakurazaka is available in an English translation (not a “novelization” of the movie, but an English rendering of the Japanese science-fiction work) at National Bookstores, Php315 a copy. Look in the Movie Tie-Ins shelf.

Between this and the annual best list, this is probably the most attention Filipino cinema has ever gotten in the venerable magazine. Well-played, everyone.

Norte, The End of History opens in New York on June 20 at the Film Society of Lincoln Center. Get your tickets here. The pop-up screenings at theatres in Metro Manila and other cities will resume very soon.

Norte, Hangganan Ng Kasaysayan has won the Gawad Urian for Best Picture, Best Screenplay (Lav Diaz and Rody Vera), Best Cinematography (Larry Manda) and Best Actress (Angeli Bayani in a very, very strong field that included the Nora Aunor and the Vilma Santos!).

We caught the first half of the awards night and were the designated accepter if it won for Best Picture, but we asked the fabulous Maya Q to give the acceptance speech instead because there was the very real possibility that we would trip when we went up the stage of the Dolphy Theatre at ABS-CBN. Not because of brain fever, but because we are a terrible klutz in our “normal” state. Then halfway through the brisk, no-nonsense awards we got very sleepy because the virus has rebooted our system and now we sleep and wake up early (and eat only during mealtimes. The virus has turned us into a normal human being! Aaaaaaaa!).

The awards we managed to catch:

Angel Aquino was nominated twice for Best Supporting Actress for Ang Huling Cha-Cha ni Anita and Porno. Fortunately despite having the vote split she still took home her first Urian trophy for Cha-Cha.

Jun Jun Quintana won for Best Supporting Actor in A Philippino Story, overcoming tough competition from Joey Marquez in OTJ and Archie Alemania in Norte. The presentors were fellow Best Actor nominees Mimi Juareza (Quick Change) and Alex Medina (Babagwa). Mimi explained why she is nominated for Actor, not Actress: if you saw Quick Change, you know that she is still…attached to maleness.

Zig Dulay was quite overcome by his victory for Best Short for Missing,

And Nanay Mameng was her badass self when she pointed out that she’s didn’t know what she was doing in the Urian when all she’s ever wanted is to help the oppressed.

Chuck Gutierrez won the Best Editing prize for Riddles of My Homecoming.

The Gawad Urian ceremony was hosted by Piolo Pascual, Bianca Gonzales, Butch Francisco and Ai-Ai de las Alas, who said she would star in an indie version of Tanging Ina in which she would give birth in close-up to each of her twelve children.

Movie #58: L’Auberge Espagnole. We thought we’d cheer ourselves up during our house arrest by watching the trilogy by Cedric Klapisch starring Romain Duris: The Spanish Apartment, Russian Dolls, and Chinese Puzzle.

We fell asleep.

Movie #59: The Immigrant by James Gray, starring Marion Cotillard, Joaquin Phoenix, Jeremy Renner. A full review coming up. Warning: Do not watch this movie while recuperating from an illness, it’s intense. As always, Joaquin is terrifyingly good.

First movie we saw in the cinema post-virus: The Edge of Tomorrow starring Tom Cruise and Emily Blunt, written by Christopher McQuarrie et al and directed by Doug Liman. We love it but related to Tom Cruise’s character so much: just as he kept dying and waking up, we kept falling asleep and waking up. It wasn’t the movie’s fault—we couldn’t sleep the previous night because our left rib still hurts from the 2D echocardiogram they did at the hospital. (Apologies to our seatmates in case we were snoring or sleep-talking, which we sometimes catch ourself doing.) The tech really crushed our rib cage; she must not have found our heart.

So we’re watching The Edge of Tomorrow again today.