Tito R. Quiling, Jr.
The COVID-19 pandemic forced the world to stay inside their homes, spending time in isolation facilities, enduring frequent lockdowns, and quarantine periods. Given the restricted movement and lack of adequate spaces, people became restless—experiencing intra and interpersonal conflicts, confusion, anxieties, and depressive episodes, while others easily adapted to the work-from-home arrangement by cultivating more life skills, taking on hobbies, and maintaining relationships virtually.
Rabid (2021) is Erik Matti’s four-episode anthology film, delivering stylized horror and black comedy which renders distressing experiences by different inhabitants at the height of the pandemic. Written by Michiko Yamamoto with Mary Rose Colindres (for “Kami Lang Ba Pwedeng Malasin”) and Leovic Arceta (for “Shit Happens”), some stories tread on familiar domestic, administrative, and economic problems that serve as partial social commentaries. With each episode running between 17 to 35 minutes, the narratives are effortlessly consumable and bookended by two strong narratives.
The first story, “Kami Lang Ba Pwedeng Malasin” (“Bad Luck is a Bitch”), is the longest one, and packaged as a classic home invasion story, where an upper middle-class family of three falls under the spell of a seemingly harmless deaf-mute beggar. Mayette (Chesca Diaz) encounters Lola (Jay Glorioso), an old woman displaced by the COVID-19 lockdown, and brings her into their home, much to her daughter’s dislike. Liz (Ameera Johara) is immediately wary about the woman’s presence—a stranger who may have the disease—a common fear during the early weeks of the pandemic. When Mayette hires Lola as their house help, the initial days were uneventful, and her husband Carlo (Jake Macapagal) is neutral about her inclusion at first. But Liz’s suspicions were confirmed one night upon seeing Lola dancing nude and chanting loudly in front of the fireplace among a sea of lit candles in their living room. Despite Carlo immediately evicting her, the next days unraveled the mystery surrounding the old woman—a mangkukulam (witch) taking over their home. With one click of her tongue, she forces the couple into doing heinous actions, from eating their house dog, to quarreling because of cheating allegations, buying expensive items, and banging their heads on the wall when they attempt to resist her control. Fearing for their lives, Liz calls her boyfriend Dexter (Kent Gonzales), a faith-healer’s nephew who convinces a terrified Liz to wear the belt to shield her from Lola’s black magic. One night, Liz manages to sneak out of the house as Mayette distracts Lola with online shopping. However, Dexter visits their home at the same time, and confronts the witch in the living room.
The cinematography by Neil Derrick Bion expresses the power struggle and class dynamics between the wealthy dwellers and the outsider, where the family is largely presented in low angles to denote their higher status, and the old woman in high angles given her lowly standing. But these angles start to become more balanced throughout the episode during the home invasion, where the witch takes over their safe space and the inhabitants are desperate to eject her, before returning to the standard angles. Towards the end, as Dexter and Lola exchange enchantments and curses, Liz arrives with the barangay tanods who are easily beaten by the witch. The distressed teen is reminded by Dexter to utter the words “susme” to defend herself from Lola’s spell. Repeating this chant, Liz finally eliminates the old woman and frees her family. But following the ongoing lockdowns in their city and their previous experience, the next visitors who knock on their home are now entertained by Liz.
The second chapter, “Iba Pa Din Ang Karne” (“Nothing Beats Meat”) is the shortest one. Set in a dystopian society and focuses on a couple living in a cave bunker, Melvin (Vance Larena) takes care of his incapacitated wife, Jane (Pam Gonzales), who is tied to several objects in the cave—a zombie confined among disco balls, camping gear, and laboratory tables. In pacifying her, he provides a diet of fruit and vegetables as advised by a friend. In the passing days, Melvin shows photos of their late daughter and short videos of fireworks on the cave’s walls to an unresponsive Jane, who grunts regularly. The scene alludes to Plato’s allegory of the cave, where the shadows create projections of perceived reality for those restricted to the space. Yet, the actual reality speaks otherwise, as the images around the cave are not accurate representations of life, at times lacking proper logic or reasoning.
Production designer Shiel Calde constructed the confined space with a range of discarded objects, proficiently illustrating the disordered world they live in. While the items aim to help them survive, the hollowness of their relationship due to one-sided engagement is evident. Melvin’s feeding regimen plans to weaken Jane for them to leave the cave, but this treatment is not working. A tender moment shows Melvin fixing Jane’s wedding dress, which he puts on her before slow dancing together. At this point, Melvin gives in and offers his wrist for Jane to draw blood. The closing scene shows the now-zombie couple stumbling out of the cave, into a trash-filled canal and out into the sun.
The third episode, “Shit Happens” offers a dark comedic take on the enduring problems with the country’s healthcare system and the overflowing demands of working in a government hospital. Nurse Becky (Ayeesha Cervantes) is nonchalant about her job, where her inattentiveness with not cleaning up the rooms or noting the doctors’ schedules pushes an argument with fellow nurse Reggie (Ricci Rivero). On a dreary night, an unhinged patient named Luzviminda Santos (Ube Lola) is left in the hallway near the nurses’ station and Becky wheels her into Room 207. She props her back onto the bed carelessly. An eerie look from the patient unnerves her, and Becky becomes aggressive in checking the patient’s statistics. Upon leaving the room, she discovers that it is now morning. In reality, it is still night time and her boyfriend Walter (Brace Arquiza) is waiting in the lobby. Becky’s warped reality has empty hallways, locked doors, and patients looking at her furiously from their respective rooms. With Room 207 always buzzing for Becky, Luzviminda chases her from the room to the toilets where she leaves feces on the bed, pushes the diaper onto her face, and vomits on the nurse.
The music arranged by Mikey Amistoso, paired with the sound design by Lamberto Casas, Jr. and his team, firmly injects anxiety, with a consistent staccato following the characters who engage in chilling rounds of hide-and-seek in the ghostly hospital halls. As Becky tries to escape, Reggie and Walter look for her, where they all meet in the off-limits basement ward, but cannot see each other. An irregular call from Becky leads the boys to check the CCTV footage, where they see her alone, but being violently pulled into Room 207. Inside, they see her strapped on the bed, in a daze, and buzzing for a nurse. Now confined in the same room, Reggie checks on Becky’s progress and says that her visa has been granted. But the girl is disturbed with a figure in the corner of the room, as Reggie keeps comforting her to recover. The film ends with Luzviminda wildly attacking Becky once more with a diaper full of feces, laughing maniacally as the nurse keeps calling for help using the same buzzer.
The fourth narrative, “HM” (“How Much?” or “Home Made”) closes the anthology film and reflects the rise of online shops during the lockdown period. Given the restrictions, many Filipinos sold items and offered services on social media. A single parent, Princess (Donna Cariaga) was retrenched from ABS-CBN’s Marketing department when the franchise was not renewed in 2020. With their funds depleted, Princess looks through many online ads and job applications to provide for her son, Nico (Alfonso Yñigo Delen). Stirred by the features on Chef Tatung and Chef Amy (Candice Ramos), she tries selling kare-kare—her special dish despite being a terrible cook. Her taste-testers include her mother and their neighbor Sam (Chrome Cosio), who both discourage her. Even with persistent promotion and discounts, she has no orders and was even banned from the online selling group.
Mica Roca’s seamless editing and the visual effects rendered by the team from Mothership tersely weaves the frequency of online advertisements, the overwhelming virtual engagement, and barrage of information at the onset of the pandemic. But instead of the visual effects distracting from the story, the graphics move the narrative forward, as the sequences are framed by social media engagement. One night, Princess discovers a Russian recipe on the Internet that makes any food appetizing but with unintended side effects, and uses the potion in her kare-kare. Testing it on her son, mother, and neighbors, the unusual positive responses enable her to sell her dish online, which immediately boom. Orders and deliveries come in fast, their funds soar, and is even interviewed by Chef Amy. However, she notices that Nico is always looking for her food and does not eat anything else.
Her patrons continue to order from her and Princess is exhausted with cooking all day and night. When Nico storms in and demands for her kare-kare which is still being prepared, she gives him the potion which he drinks savagely. Upon finishing, Nico sees that her sleeping mother has peanut sauce on her fingers and eats it off her. But their neighbor Sam breaks into their house, looking for her dish and turns violent as he consumes the containers filled with kare-kare. In her defense, Princess stabs him. Caught by surprise, Princess lures Nico into their bedroom as she fixes their clothes to leave. At this point, their house is surrounded by deranged customers banging on her walls, windows, and doors. Terrified, Princess gets her son but the crowd forces their way in and attacks her. Like vultures eating a carcass, the mother gets devoured. On the kitchen table, her laptop screen shows several notifications coming in and emails confirming her interviews and successful applications.
Among the episodes in Rabid, the first and fourth ones are the strongest—mixing the reality of being restricted to one’s home, finding ways to survive, referring to local magical beliefs that escapes one’s logic, and absurdist situations that augment layers of entertainment and intrigue. In both stories, the house as a place of refuge, mainly during the quarantine period, turns into a dangerous space for its inhabitants with outsiders invading their homes. Their routines inside their houses are upended and their security is compromised. For the wealthy family, willful assistance was a risk that did not pay off. For the single parent, the tendency to cut corners for survival, led them to their demise. Likewise, the changing dynamics between the self and one’s family members under a stressful atmosphere create more strain, as the boundaries between work and home lives are blurred with the forced norms.
The second chapter serves as fodder in completing the film anthology, but it is worth noting that the air of abandonment, confusion, and chaos in the episode refers to the early months of the contagion. The couple in the story is left to fend for themselves using available items and tried to use entertainment as a distraction from the chaos caused by the pandemic—conjuring reminders of people’s various coping strategies. In addition, the judicious topic on caregiving under difficult circumstances effectively links with the third episode’s emphasis on the lack of funding for healthcare workers who faced an absurd amount of work and risk, with no proper compensation from concerned government agencies. The incessant use of fecal matter as a form of attack also symbolizes how healthcare workers have been treated in the last two years. While the physical mark on surfaces and individuals may be rinsed off, the unyielding stench from covering up the ungainly response to the COVID-19 pandemic in the Philippines remains.
The anxieties that citizens carry due to daily engagements was aggravated by the pandemic, and in Matti’s Rabid, collective experiences relating to inadequate information on the global disease, the uncertainty of one’s health and economic conditions, and the fear of engaging with others because of the lockdowns, remind viewers that people can turn rabid in the face of danger and survival.