Poetry need not be in words, verbally or written.
It can also be expressed in plain visuals as film artist Jose Javier Reyes has recently done in Viva Films’ “Secrets” for Vivamax.
In the opening scene, Reyes’ cinematographer Jan Olivier Evangelista, also known as Jeyow Evangelista, has captured and spread onscreen a lyrical tracking top shot, or drone shot, of a rustic view of the location starting off with a bridge over a placid river, rice fields, roads, pathways, several houses set apart, mountains and hills on the periphery etc.
These are all countryside unique mise-en-scene that leads to the sonnets of life experiences about a gathering in a beach resort of four major characters, namely, Janine (Janelle Tee), Christian (Benz Sangalang), Felina (Denise Esteban) and Leo (Felix Roco), the latter accused by Janine as a manipulator of their emotions that unleash their sexual fantasies on fleeting moments.
Janine and Chris are couple who tries to fix their relationships away from the bustling city to a quiet place where they can introspect if not vent their pent- up angst and surprisingly to interact with Felina, and mostly with Leo who would weave into their lives impending problems and solutions like the latter’s tempting,and conquering the hidden urges, not entirely, particularly sex, though, of the vacationing lovers—the woman’s hunger and submission to more exciting sexual acrobats set against her aversion towards him and the man’s concealed gaiety where he sets free his mundane desires of M2M after a drinking spree, an aborted orgy—surprisingly Felina has disappeared just like that at the beer party of three—and a titillating body massage from Leo.
These scenes may appear to be sexual but they are all naturalistic tendencies of these individuals motivated by their baser instincts and painted in psychedelic verses.
The successive juxtapositions of natural sets as sunrise and sunset, high and low tides, riding, billowing and rolling waves, shining particles of sand etc. with the characters’ conscious and innate interplay to advance the narrative are depending on the contexts of the personal inner struggles to actualize and dramatize musings like Janine lying, and cavorting alone on the coastline when she is confronted with her conflicting thoughts and feelings about Leo—would she give in to his allures and teases while distrusting him or Leo’s stripping off his clothes as a teaser to jump into the sea while convincing Chris’ dilly-dallying moments to disrobe and giving in to his newfound pal’s prodding to go au natural etc.
Or these beautiful scenic spots of the bucolic nature or the manmade bonfire interspersed with human drama on the beach are just inanimate objects taken literally sans intention to symbolize, internalize or intellectualize anything as one of the features of poesy is just to enjoy the sound of the waves, the burning of the leaves and woods or the eye candy of the crimson shades of the skies.
The caveat, after all, is the logic, consistency, discursiveness, clarity etc. of the elements of the poem.