Analysis on the Impact of Authority Abuse on the Characters of Joel Lamangan’s Bakit May Kahapon Pa?

Abstract

Films from the Post-modernism period in the Philippines tackle mostly on issues regarding the post Martial Law happenings and what has happened to the country ever since. Most films and stories then also revolved on tragedy with hints of action. Joel Lamangan’s Bakit May Kahapon Pa is a 1996 film that circulates on characters that have been greatly impacted by military abuse, which is a real life happening during that period where the military abuse their authority. Some kill ruthlessly, some scare lowly citizens, and while others just use it as an untouchable card. This film caught our attention as it is relevant to the culture in the Philippines, even unaccepted as a culture, unfortunately, police and other armed forces are being seen on the news with issues regarding their abuse of power up to this date. Aside from other similar scholarly articles, this mainly focuses on how military abuse of authority can affect and make changes to a person, an event, and even history. Thus, this paper aims to investigates the impact of abusive authority on the characters in Joel Lamangan's Bakit May Kahapon Pa? Specifically, it delves into the film’s characters as seen through extracting the plot, and lastly through the film’s setting, whether it has an influence on the film progression. The method used in gathering the data is qualitative, in particular, discourse analysis. The gathered data is supported by Film Theory of Henri Bergson, Sergei Eisenstein’s Marxist Film Theory and Cultural Materialism of Marvin Harris. Through the utilization of this method, Joel Lamangan’s Bakit May Kahapon Pa? receives a thorough investigation to achieve the purpose of this study, to disseminate the data gathered that upholds the main problem and sub-problems. Additionally, to provide reliable and credible information to literary arguments. The findings imply that there is an eminent abuse of military authority that has created an impact on the characters of Joel Lamangan’s Bakit May Kahapon Pa?