Restoring ‘Portrait,’ the work of 3 national artists

Restoring a classic film like Lamberto V. Avellana’s “A Portrait of the Artist as Filipino” can be compared to a treasure hunt, and in some instances, to assembling a giant jigsaw puzzle.

It can also be like an archaeological dig, said elusive filmmaker Mike de Leon, who is spearheading the digital restoration of the 1965 film produced by his late father, Manuel de Leon.

“Restoring films … is like unearthing artifacts; [in this case, digging up] actual documents from a bygone era,” said the award-winning director behind such screen gems as “Itim,” “Batch ’81” and “Kisapmata.”

Restoring “Portrait” can also be considered a landmark cultural event, declared De Leon, as the film showcases “the work of three national artists.”

Explained Briccio Santos, chair of the Film Development Council of the Philippines (FDCP): “The film was adapted from a play by Nick Joaquin, was directed by Lamberto Avellana, and top-billed by Daisy Hontiveros-Avellana. All three of them are national artists, which underlines the film’s cultural significance.”

Great heritage value

“Portrait” also has great heritage value, Santos added of the restored classic that premieres at the Cultural Center of the Philippines (CCP) on April 25. “The film pays homage to the walled city of Intramuros and our people’s collective memory.”

Sadly, said De Leon, he can’t stress enough the urgency of the need to preserve our film heritage.

“It is sad to state that, to my knowledge, there is no longer any complete 35mm film original of any movie from that era,” the filmmaker said. “As in other works of art in other disciplines like music, painting and architecture, we have lost so much and are losing much more still.”

“Portrait,” whose restoration was partly funded by the FDCP and the National Film Archive of the Philippines (NFAP), premieres in April, which marks the Avellana classic’s 50th anniversary, as well as the birth centennial year of its director (Avellana, in February), and producer (the older De Leon, in April).

The younger De Leon expressed the hope that the film classic would find an audience among today’s youth despite its dismal box office showing in 1965 when he first saw it.

“My classmates at Ateneo shared my perplexity: Why was the film in English? When it failed miserably at the box office, I thought it was because of the English dialogue.”

Tough sell

But it would still be a tough sell even in Filipino, De Leon acknowledged. “It was too cerebral and dealt with ilustrado culture, which very few people can relate to,” he said, adding that he hopes things would be different this time.

“Even if the film has only one screening at the CCP, I feel that I should try to find the representative audience that once eluded it 50 years ago,” the director said.

De Leon’s book project, a monograph released in line with the launch of the restored “Portrait,” should stir things up a bit.

“The book was written by Angelo R. Lacuesta and designed by Cesar Hernando and Tom Estrera III,” the filmmaker said. “I’ve always wanted to publish a book, but past attempts fizzled out. This time, I have full control and spending nobody else’s money but my own.”

Titled “Contra Mundum, A Restoration of Nick Joaquin’s ‘A Portrait of the Artist as Filipino,’” the book is primarily about the Avellana classic, but will also touch on the era of the movie studio and the role of De Leon’s grandmother and father in it.

History of PH cinema

De Leon said the story of “Portrait” also recounts the history of Philippine cinema in particular and the Philippines in general.

“The story started in 1939, when my grandmother (Doña Sisang de Leon) produced ‘Giliw Ko’ under LVN (productions), and ended with ‘Portrait,’ which was produced by my father in 1965,” the director said. The book spanned the years “from President Manuel L. Quezon’s peace time in 1939 to the decline of the movie industry and the [election] of President Ferdinand Marcos in 1965.”

“Portrait” is De Leon’s second restoration project with the FDCP, NFAP and L’Immagine Ritrovata, a renowned film laboratory based in Bologna, Italy, after he restored Lino Brocka’s “Maynila sa mga Kuko ng Liwanag,” for which he is credited as producer and director of photography.

Putting “Portrait” together entailed painstaking detective work that spanned two continents, Asia and Europe.

Like those of “Maynila,” the original camera negatives of “Portrait” are stored in the Asian Film Archive in Singapore after they were turned over by De Leon to the Asian Film Archive in 2005, the year of his father’s death and the year when the family movie production outfit, LVN, was sold.

Lost soundtrack

“Although the original soundtrack was lost, I was able to reconstruct the soundtrack from two prints that were still in existence in 2005,” the director recalled. “During the digital restoration late last year, by pure luck, a print of the film was found at the Deutsche Kinemathek (German Cinematheque).”

A year ago, De Leon recalled meeting with Davide Pozzi, director of the L’Immagine Ritrovata. It was during the meeting that Marti Magsanoc, a NFAP consultant, raised the possibility of finding a print of “Portrait” in Europe.

Bono Olgado, former NFAP head, coordinated with the German Cinematheque to borrow a print of the film, the director added.

“Later, Davide confirmed that the sound in the German Cinematheque print was better than the duplicate I had done in 2005. Our system at LVN then was still a hybrid one, both analog and digital,” he said. “So the audio from the (German) print was used instead because it was a first generation print struck from the original sound negatives.”

De Leon recalled that “Portrait” was shown in Frankfurt, Germany, in 1967. “That could be the reason it wound up at the German Cinematheque,” he explained.

Jigsaw puzzle

Serendipitous circumstances aside, restoring films can be a tricky process similar to assembling a giant jigsaw puzzle, he said.

“In restoring old films, we would sometimes find half a reel of a 16mm film [containing] one half of the movie, with the rest on tape. I would put them together, even rearrange sequences, because for some strange reason, we would find the scenes in the reels all jumbled up,” De Leon said.

Technology definitely helped, he said, adding that he took part in the “Portrait” restoration process at the L’Immagine Ritrovata by remote control.

Like in a previous restoration project, “Maynila sa mga Kuko ng Liwanag,” De Leon focused on the “grading” part of the process. Blu-ray discs were regularly sent from Bologna to Manila. “I would send back comments and corrections afterward,” he said.

De Leon likewise took charge of subtitling the film in Manila.

“I prepared all the subtitles here, with the help of (Lamberto’s daughter) Ivi Avellana-Cosio and (writer) Erwin Romulo and then I sent the production company in Italy the mp4 files with the subtitles cued exactly where I wanted them,” he said.

The hard work is meant to go beyond the premiere of “Portrait,” De Leon said.

“The interest in the film today should go beyond cinema because whether one likes the film or not, it speaks with great eloquence about the yearning for a lost era that will never return, but should never be forgotten,” the director added.

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