While feasting on yet another lamb dish in a café in Reykjavik I asked my friends Eric, Oxali, and Carina if they had seen the trailer for the latest Joel Lamangan magnum opus, My Father Myself. Eric and Carina hadn’t, but Oxali, being a twitter and fashionpulis dot com expert, had seen the damn trailer many, many times. Just like me. The four of us had just completed an eight-day bus tour around Iceland, had eaten all meals together, and climbed glaciers and such together, ie, at that point we had already talked about most of everything, justifying, in my mind, initiating conversation about lurid movie trailers. Eric and Carina didn’t seem too interested, but they noted how excited Oxali had become, so they indulged us and asked, “fine, what is it about?”

Ganito ‘yon, I started. The titular father, Jake Cuenca, and his wife, Dimples Romana, adopt a young boy, Matthew. They don’t seem to have any fertility issues, as they already have a pre-pubertal daughter, Mica. Mica grows up and falls in love with this adopted brother, who subsequently impregnates her. The revelation that Mica is pregnant causes Jake to turn ballistic, but maybe not for the reason that we think. Because in the next scene it is revealed that Jake, and his adopted son Matthew, are in love with each other, as Dimples discovers them in bed fucking each other ass to ass with a double-headed dild’—just kidding, this is not twinkcest porn—but Mica does find Jake and Matthew kissing in a cemetery. Dimples then utters the most powerful line in the trailer, one that ensures a best actress nod: “kahit alam ko sa kaibuturan ng puso kong bakla ka, pinili pa rin kita!” The end, I said with pride, but Oxali was shaking her head in violent disapproval.

“You failed to mention,” Oxali said, “That the trailer also reveals that the boy, Matthew, is the son of the recently deceased Domeng, who was the ex-boyfriend of Jake!” We reviewed the trailer together, and in a flashback Jake is seen kissing Domeng by the pond, and the young Matthew has seen them! And based on a photo that Jake was touching lovingly, it seems like Domeng is played by Allan Paule! Who is Allan Paule? Eric asked, and I had to restrain Oxali from reaching across the table and clawing his face in indignation.

“Allan Paule is the star of the 90’s masterpiece, Ang Paraiso Ni Efren,” I said. Oxali and I then took turns fleshing out the plot. I had seen the movie at the UP Film Center in 1999. It is about this guy Efren who keeps his gay lover, Allan Paule, his wife, and his female lover all in the same house. “It is essentially a film about peaceful co-existence despite our differences,” I said, when Eric and Carina started getting uncomfortable. My favorite scene is when the prostitute Anna Capri sort of rebukes the gay character of Allan Paule with “Bakit ka nasasaktan pag sinabihan kitang bakla, eh bakla ka naman talaga?” to which Allan Paule retorts with “Bakit ka nasasaktan pag tinawag kitang puta, eh puta ka naman talaga?”

I apologize– I was planning to write some travelogue about our recent Iceland trip, but was clearly distracted by the fabulosity that is My Father, Myself!

Will try to write a proper travelogue, in the meantime, here’s a video clip of me doing an impression of Miss Mocha U version 2018. I would do this everyday throughout the two-week trip, and to my friends’ credit they were able to restrain themselves from slapping the crap out of me.

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