This film review was published in the FilAm Star newspaper in the January 1-15, 2009 issue
Lino Brocka's "Tinimbang Ka Ngunit Kulang" (“You Were Judged and Found Wanting") was produced in 1974.
"Tinimbang" was the winner of six FAMAS (Filipino Academy of Movie Arts and Sciences) awards including Best Picture and Best Director. Filipino movie critic Noel Vera listed it as fourth among the top thirteen most important Filipino films ever made. "Tinimbang" is also one of those few films that was able to combine true cinematic artistry with box-office appeal. The movie's success gave Lino Brocka a permanent name in Philippine cinema.
"Tinimbang” stars two actors who would become legends in the Filipino movie industry, Christopher de Leon and Eddie Garcia. In the movie, we see a very young, sans mustache Christopher de Leon—-he was around nineteen or twenty years old at the time of filming—-and a still dark-haired Eddie Garcia who plays his father, Cesar Blanco. Cesar is the wealthiest person in the small town they live in.
Cesar is also a hopeless womanizer which is established early on in the opening scenes of "Tinimbang." In these scenes, Cesar witnesses the horror of an abortion gone terribly wrong. It involves his unborn child with Kuala, played by actress Lolita Rodriguez. Kuala is just another one of Cesar's many female conquests. But her agonizing abortion turns her into a madwoman whose presence and memory continues to haunt Cesar throughout the film.
Another central character in "Tinimbang" is Junior as he is portrayed by Christopher de Leon. Although handsome, good-hearted, and well-liked by most everyone in the town, Junior has a lot to learn about life. And he doesn't learn the easy way. First, Junior finds out that his father is a macho, shameless skirt-chaser. Then his girlfriend, the attractive Evangeline---who is played by an equally-young Hilda Koronel---eventually dumps him for another boy. To top it off, Junior gives into his desires one drunken night by having sexual intercourse with the mayor's born out-of-wedlock daughter (the role of Laurice Guillen).
This is where the lonely leper Berto (Mario O'Hara) comes in. Like Kuala, Berto is treated like Shakespeare’s Caliban by the town's population because of his deformed, diseased-ridden face. But no matter what anyone says or thinks, Berto does have a heart of gold. He brings the demented Kuala into his ramshackle home so that they can live as a couple. Junior, offended by the way Berto and Kuala have been stigmatized, as well as by the hypocrisy and small-mindedness of the townspeople, becomes close friends with them until the film's dramatic ending.
"Tinimbang" goes against the grain of other Tagalog movies in that it avoids the trap of being overly melodramatic in style and simplistic in plot. Lino Brocka had that great talent for framing together the right amount of emotion with strong themes, unpredictable plots, and incredible characters in his movies.
In "Tinimbang Ka Ngunit Kulang," these all come together to create a powerful film that may have been produced more than thirty years ago, but has as much meaning today for viewers as it did when it was first released.
ALLEN GABORRO
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