Heneral Luna

General Antonio Luna tries to fight the Americans in 1899 while the government he serves is still arguing about whether to. The film opens as Spain quietly sells the Philippines to the United States for 20,000,000 dollars, and at a cabinet meeting in the Barasoain Church, Luna and General Jose Alejandrino demand war while Felipe Buencamino and Pedro Paterno push for an accommodation with the Americans. President Emilio Aguinaldo tries to negotiate instead, and the film follows Luna as he takes command of a divided, poorly supplied army against a much stronger enemy. Luna is played as a brilliant, short-tempered officer who cannot get his own side to follow him. He is backed by three trusted men who form the emotional core of the film: the level-headed Colonel Francisco Paco Roman, the earthier Captain Eduardo Rusca, and the Bernal brothers. When the Kawit battalion commander Pedro Janolino refuses to send reinforcements because the order did not come directly from Aguinaldo, Luna humiliates and demotes him, then issues Article One, a standing order that insubordination will be punished by execution. His feud with General Tomas Mascardo, who defies his orders instead of fighting the Americans, becomes one more sign that the young republic is turning on itself faster than the invaders can beat it. Roughly 90 percent of Heneral Luna was shot on location, largely around Magdalena in Laguna and Las Casas Filipinas de Acuzar in Bataan, standing in for towns of 1899. Cinematographer Pong Ignacio drew on paintings from the period, including work by Luna's own brother Juan, and cited Stanley Kubrick's Paths of Glory as a reference for the trench and battlefield scenes. John Arcilla plays Luna opposite Mon Confiado as Aguinaldo, and part of the story is filtered through Joven Hernando, a fictional journalist invented to interview Luna and give the audience an outside vantage point on him. Heneral Luna was released on September 9, 2015, and went on to become the highest-grossing Filipino historical film of its time, helped by a marketing tagline, "Bayan o Sarili" (Nation or Self). It was later chosen as the Philippine entry for Best Foreign Language Film at the 88th Academy Awards and became the first installment in director Jerrold Tarog's Bayaniverse trilogy, followed by Goyo: The Boy General.