The Blossoming of Maximo Oliveros (Filipino)

The first thing that strikes you when you watch this film is the reality with which the actors have acted and the direction has been done in the inner streets of Manila. The other main important thing that I thought was the acceptance of Maxi being gay by pretty much everyone around him. No one bullies him or other kids who are so obviously gay that they are more of a girl than a girl.

Maxi is a young 12 year old effeminate boy living in Manila slums with his father and 2 elder brothers Bogs and Boy who are all pety thieves and make a living out of this. After the death of his mother due to an unknown illness Maxi has taken over her role in taking care of his family from cooking food to cleaning. Entire family totally adores him and protects him as well. Life is good like that until a cop Victor enters the picture. A no nonsense cop, he wants to wipe crime. Maxi for some reason gets a huge crush on this cop. Victor who is a quiet shy and introvert man also likes the boy and becomes his friend without any wrong intentions. When Boy accidentally kills a man, the police just needs a witness to prove. Victor tries Maxi to ay something but he doesn't. Maxi's family ask him to stop seeing Victor and beat him up real bad. When a new sergeant comes in the town, he treads a new path and ends up killing Maxi's father which is witnessed by Maxi. Maxi is heart broken. As much as he loves Victor and is deeply heart broken, he is not ready to forgive him for what he did. In the end he says "There are many evils in the world but I had only one father', it sums it all. Everyone would have loved to see Victor and Maxi come to a closure but I thought that the end was beautiful when Victor now wants to talk to Maxi and be friends again but Maxi just ignores him and continues on his way to school.

Like I mentioned above, there are lot of good things in the film. Efemintae gays can peacefully exist. The support and love Maxi's family give him is very heart warming. It is as if the fact that Maxi is gay doesn't even exist in their thoughts which is wonderful. Even the homoerotic scenes between Maxi and Victor (who by the way was quite good looking) were beautifully handled. Since we have a kid involved they had to be done tastefully, respectfully and beautifully. It broke my heart when a young Maxi cries because he realizes he cannot get the man he so loves

I enjoyed the film. It is long and bit boring sometimes but from an overall theme perspective, it is definitely worth a watch (6/10)