Pleasant Surprise: A Review of "Kontrabida Academy"

 directed by Chris Martinez

written by Alpha Habon, Randolph Longjas and Martinez

I tend to expect very little from original Netflix movies by way of production value or storytelling. While Netflix has managed to produce its fair share of decent movies, they seem, in equal measure, capable of producing some complete and utter shlock, and that is often the case with its Filipino-produced content, which tends to be derivative and sometimes nonsensical.   It was such tempered expectations, a few weeks ago, that I watched "Kontrabida Academy" an original Netflix film starring several known Filipino actors including comediennes Eugene Domingo and Barbie Forteza. The premise was fun and outlandish enough; Gigi (Forteza) a downtrodden assistant restaurant manager with problems at home, at work and in her relationship, is at wit's end when a mysterious television set is delivered to her home. As she watches the drama always broadcast on the TV, one of the characters on screen, the villainous Mauricia (Eugene Domingo) invites her to step into her world, and one day, in a fit of despair with her life, Gigi does exactly that, and discovers an incredible new world beyond the screen, but one which she can only navigate with the skills that Mauricia and her cohort of fellow villains kontrabidas can teach her...at the Kontrabida Academy! Gigi's life, suffice it to say, will never be the same.

Let's get this out of the way; this film is not high art, but at no point does it aspire to be so.  It is, however a whole lot of campy fun. Writer-director Chris Martinez and his co-writers Alpha Habon and Randolph Longjas lean heavily into the tropes of Filipino soap opera writing and have a whole lot of "meta" fun in the process. It helps, of course, that they have an entirely game cast led by Barbie Forteza and Eugene Domingo, and including actors both old (Michael De Mesa, Baron Geisler, Carmina Villaroel and Jaime Fabregas) and new (Jameson Blake, Xyriel Manabat).  Impressively, though, the film also has something to say about the quality of writing in Philippine soap operas, critiquing the one-dimensional manner in which "good" and "bad" characters are portrayed, basically explaining that in real life, people have to be a little bit of both. 

It's a film that, like most of Netflix's catalogue, is pretty easily forgotten, but it was worth the time it took to sit down and watch it. One could say that's the beauty of Netflix; it gives us the opportunity to watch, free of charge, movies that we otherwise would not have the time and money to check out.

8/10