Ma’ Rosa Depicts Social Realities and Imparts A Valuable Life Lesson

Brillante Mendoza’s latest film, “Ma’ Rosa”, has garnered a best actress award for Jaclyn Jose in this year’s Cannes Film Festival. 

Ma' Rosa  movie poster

source: imdb.com

The film also has brought a great achievement for the Philippines since Cannes Film Festival is one of the most prestigious film events in  the world and for a Philippine film to be included in the Cannes it is indeed something to celebrate and be proud of.

Ma' Rosa film cast at the Cannes film festival  with
Director Brillante Mendoza (fourth from the left)

source: imdb.com

The movie revolves around the life of Rosa Reyes, a mother trying to make ends meet to provide for her family. She runs a sari-sari store(a term used for a small neighborhood store in the Philippines) in their home located at a shanty town in Metro Manila. To earn more money, she sells “ice” (a type of crystal meth drug) using their sari-sari store as a front for her illegal sideline business.

Jaclyn Jose played the lead role in Ma' Rosa

source: imdb.com

The film depicts the harsh reality of how poverty pushes some people to get into doing illegal business in order to survive. Below is the official movie trailer sourced from youtube.com:

The movie reveals how drugs and corruption affects the lives of families. In Rosa’s case, when she and her husband were held in the custody of the police after a raid on the eve of her husband’s birthday at their home, her children ended up getting the tough task of raising funds needed to pay off the cops in order for their parents to be set free. The film also shows that during troubled and desperate times, family members sacrifice and become resourceful in order to find ways to help out their parents.

The story shows real scenes that show the unfortunate circumstances that families living in poverty are exposed to. The scenes showing haggling of several characters in the story shows that it is a common thing done for survival and the corruption of the cops that subjects the characters into a state of pressure and desparation shows that there is a deeper issue that needs to resolved by the government to stop the drug issue in our country.

It was revealed in one of the media interviews with Director Brillante Mendoza that the inspiration for the film was based on a true to life story of an individual that he met before who shared her story on how she peddled drugs in order to provide for her family. Thus, the scenes and characters in the film were based on the sad realities experienced by typical families struggling due to poverty.

Jaclyn Jose’s portrayal of Rosa shows her impressive ability as an actress to truly be in character all throughout the film. Her facial expressions and her lines in the movie communicated to the viewers that she is not the type of mother who gives up when faced with unfavorable circumstances in life. She is determined to stay strong and find ways to help her family.

In the final scene, Ma’ Rosa, shows that sometimes sad realizations come after going through a major family crisis. To some film viewers it may seem that the ending scene was left hanging.  I actually heard some people reacting that it seems it was not a proper ending when I watched it at the cinema.

For me, the final scene in Ma’ Rosa is a scene that gives viewers a time to see and think about what are in Rosa’s thoughts as tears flow on her face as she eats a street food snack and sees a simple family who amidst poverty have chosen to make an honest living and support each other through their pedicab style mobile  store.

The film also certainly shows the humanity and imperfection of the main character since even if Ma’ Rosa is into an illegal drug business she still is a mother who merely wants to provide for and help her family.

After viewing Ma’ Rosa, one will be able to see the evident problems on corruption and drugs, which are also key issues that are relevant today in the Philippines’ current political situation. Furthermore, it also imparts a valuable life lesson that at the end of the day it is important to choose to do good and have the right values and integrity no matter what social economic class one belongs to since choosing to do evil leads to unfortunate events that can affect our loved ones.