More honing, learning needed for stellar ‘K’

IÑIGO Pascual (left), Sofia Andres and Julian Estrada in “Relaks, It’s Just Pag-ibig”

When we first wrote about “Relaks, It’s Just Pag-ibig,” we focused on the supporting performances in the teen flick for the simple reason that, in our view, they were among the best aspects of the production. They were even more effective than the portrayals of the movie’s teen lead stars, which we’re focusing on today.

What made them less than the thespic triumphs they were obviously meant to be? Let’s start with the female lead character, played by Sofia Andres. As written, her role “felt” like it was meant for a younger performer, since we first get to meet her on her 16th birthday.

Unfortunately, Sofia looks and acts years older, so the inappropriate assignment of role robs the character of some of her essential freshness and vulnerability.

SOFIA Andres’ character is too dreamy and ditzy.

In addition, some plot elements make the character too unrealistically dreamy and ditzy to be taken seriously as a person who’s “worth” viewers’ empathy and concern:

Just because she (accidentally or “fatedly”) found a letter ostensibly from modern-day counterparts of “Noli” characters Elias and Salome, she travels all the way to a beach in the Visayas to find either the “classical” epitomizers of true love, or their embodiments!

Even more fantastically, she convinces not one but two male teens (Iñigo Pascual and Julian Estrada) to go on the impossible trip, and they end up fighting for her heart of hearts!

For his part, Julian comes across interestingly with a “bad boy” tinge, but his slightly surly acting style or projection quickly becomes predictable and even shallow, so his stellar debut is less remarkable and promising than even Sofia’s already compromised effort.

If Julian wants to have a longer acting career, he really has to get out of the “bad boy” box that his first starring portrayal inhabits, which (after Robin Padilla set its template decades ago) certainly doesn’t lack for imitators or (to be more generous) emulators.

Finally, what about the film’s biggest prospect for stardom, Iñigo—does he set the movie screen suitably on fire? Iñigo does well in his first major acting showcase, but his performance falls short of knocking his prospects out of the ballpark.

The “fault” isn’t entirely his alone, because scripting infelicities limit his characterization’s believability: A rich kid with no evident parental supervision, he gets practically everything he wants and has a super-silly girlfriend named Cupcake.

That may make for some outrageous humor, but it also says something about his character’s lack of good grounding and solid judgment. Despite this, however, he implausibly agrees to go on a lovelorn lark with this feisty stranger he’s just met!

Viewed separately from these scripting limitations, Iñigo exudes an appropriately youthful vibe and verve—except that he still doesn’t know how to “share” his emotions with viewers by way of his eyes, which he tends to keep shyly “hooded,” thus lessening the empathetic power of his portrayal.

On the other hand, Iñigo sings on-note and well, which is more than we can say for most of his frog-voiced contemporaries.

Still, it’s clear that he needs a lot more honing and learning before he can be objectively regarded as a major stellar discovery—for the long term. Iñigo may have the right “royal” roots in the biz, but he has to establish his own “K” to make his stellar prospects truly—A-OK!