Fairytales don’t often concern themselves with the details: once it’s happily ever after, that’s it. Anything else is in the domain of speculation (and fanmade fiction). One could see Michael Tuviera’s The Kingdom as an example of that, a modern day fairytale built on one of the rarer subgenres of Filipino cinema: alternate history fiction. If you’ve read a Harry Turtledove novel, been vaguely aware of the Marvel multiverse or watched/read The Man in the High Castle, that’s pretty much what it alternate history fiction is: stories that begin with a question: what if?
The question The Kingdom asks is tantalizing: what would happen if the Philippines was never colonized? Apparently, it would be a Malay kingdom named Kalayaan, ruled by kings or Lakan who, if legend is to be believed, has the blood of Bathala in their veins. The incumbent monarch is Makisig (Vic Sotto), who has ruled the land of Kalayaan for many years. Social status in Kalayaan is determined by how many tattoos you have, and Makisig has them in spades. Makisig’s three children, Bagwis (Sid Lucero), Matimyas (Christine Reyes) and Lualhati (Sue Ramirez) are set to succeed their father, but a kidnapping complicates matters and gives hints towards something bigger and much more sinister than intially thought.
The world Tuviera and his team build is nothing short of spellbinding: everything from set designs and costumes is immersive. A few janky CGI shots may not be the best, but they are the exception to the rule. Nestor Abrogena, who did the PD work for this film, deserves an award. The lore, on the other hand, isn’t all completely filled out: why does multicultural Kalayaan with many different tribes feel monolithic? What happened to the Muslim tribes in the south? What’s the deal with some Spanish names in a country (Kiko from Francisco?) that wasn’t touched by the Spaniards? This isn’t necessarily a bad thing: these questions and gaps in the lore don’t mean that the film is bad, it means that it’s fertile ground for expansion. Films like The Kingdom should encourage questions and discourse, and judging from Vic Sotto’s penchant for cribbing from popular properties in his many projects (the Dune and Game of Thrones inspiration is not lost on me) there might be plans on spinoffs or sequels to expand the lore.
This leads me to something I noticed in The Kingdom that stops what is already a good film from being amazing. In short scenes, we see that Kalayaan is no utopia: its citizens suffer under feudal rule, oppressed by those in higher positions of power, and the governments meant to serve the people are as inefficient and corrupt as the systems we already have. Sulo (Piolo Pascual) seems to be the voice of the masses and their struggles, and as the film goes on he is given an opportunity to try to rectify this. On the other hand, the way the film ends, while satisfying in its own way, leaves the larger problems of Kalayaan unsolved. I can excuse it partly because The Kingdom feels like a fairytale, and like I said earlier, fairytales don’t concern themselves with details after they’ve ended, leaving the rest to our imagination. And, fingers crossed, Tuviera and co. may not even have to leave it to our imagination, as there is definitely potential to continue the story of Kalayaan for many years to come.
The Kingdom is still a very entertaining film and one that is genuinely engaging, its fully realized world a fertile ground for the imagination of audiences. Like last year’s Mallari, it’s audacious in its scope and ambitious in an industry that wants to play it safe, a relative rarity in mainstream Philippine cinema.
