Acclaimed Filipino director Lav Diaz has made films ranging between five and eight hours, so his latest, clocking in at a mere four-hours-and-10-minutes, and his first in colour, is a walk in the park. A transposition of Dostoevsky’s Crime And Punishment , it sees disillusioned intellectual Fabian (Sid Lucero) commit a violent crime and allow unemployed family man Joaquin (Archie Alemania) to be imprisoned for it.
Unfolding in lengthy, frequently static takes, it accrues tremendous character detail, thematic heft and emotional intensity while presenting a country broken by abject poverty, political corruption and half-baked ideologies. Superb.
