The Bamboo Gods Project: Da Best In Da West (1981)

1981 - Da Best In Da West (RVQ Productions)

[Release date 12th June 1981]

Director Romy Villaflor Story Roy Vera Cruz, Ben Feleo Screenplay Ben Feleo Executive Producer Dolphy [as Rodolfo Vera Quizon] Cinematography Alfonso Alvarez Music Dominic [Salustiano] Lyrics Dolphy Choreography Lito Calzado Editor Efren Jarlego Sound Supervisor Luis Reyes Field Soundman Ledwino Robiso General Manager Manny “Boy” Quizon Assistant General Manager Laura Cooper-Nurse Production Manager Caledonio “Boy” Pineda Project Coordinator Danding Inocencio Production Coordinator: Baguio City Barangay Captain Manny Tibayan Assistant Director Danny Hernandez Special Effects Eddie Torrente Stunt Coordinators Fred Esplana, Jay Grama, Eddie Nicart, Jun de Guia Set Decorator Pepe Cruz Property Masters Maning Cabides, Doming Ocenar Cameraman Lito Lapara Assistant Editors Armando Jarlego, Dante de Leon Rerecording Technicians Ramon Reyes, Oscar Magnaye Executive Assistant/Comptroller Paquito Principe Bautista

Cast Dolphy (Wild Bill Hika), Lito Lapid (Dalton), Yehlen Catral (Jane), Nina Sara (Estralita), Romy Diaz (Facundo), Teroy de Guzman (Barman), Conde Ubaldo, Weng Weng (Deputy Bronson), Tony Carreon [as Antonio Carrion] (Don Oligareon), Naty Santiago (Estralita’s Aunt), Er “Canton” Salazar (Don Oligareon’s Chinese Henchman), Manny Tibayan, Ben Johnson (Mayor), Amay Bisaya (Jailer), Luis San Juan (Diego), Fred Esplana (Facundo’s Goon), Eddie Nicart (Facundo’s Goon), Jay Grama (Facundo’s Goon), Jun de Guia (Facundo’s Goon), Sancho Tesalona, Joe Cunanan (Diablo’s Goon), Romy Nario (Facundo’s Goon), Robert Talby [as Robert Talvy] (Facundo’s Goon), Jing Caparas, Mel Arca, Nonong de Andres (Undertaker), Rene Tupaz (Tribesman), Telly Babasa, Raquel Sayson (Tribesman), Dante Javier, Boyet Argame (Tribesman), “Pete”/Peter M. Caballes (Jailer), Pete Andal, Kent Gonzales, Roger Saulog, Vic Santos, Neri Santos, Eddie Villamor, Remy Nocum, Ben Sanchez, Mando Pangilinan, Oscar Reyes, SOS Daredevils, Lito Calzado’s Body Machine, Panchito (Inkong Gaspar), Paquito Diaz (Diablo), Rodolfo “Boy” Garcia (Vic Tango), Max Vera (Joey Tango), Max Alvarado (Tito Tango), Dely Atay-Atayan (Fat Woman in Credits), Georgie Quizon (Tribal Witchdoctor), Don Pepot (Tribe Spokesman), Florence Carvajal (Large Native Princess), Johnny Madrid, Efred Lapid, Robert Rivera, Steve Alcarado (Bandit), Ruben Ramos (Thug with Sword), Avel Morado, Josie Andico, George Henry Jr

COMEDY/WESTERN/MUSICAL

Review, Dolphy and Eddie Nicart interviews by Andrew Leavold

[Previously appeared in Leavold's book The Search For Weng Weng (2017)]

Much of what still remains of the Philippines’ filmic legacy is currently stored at ABS-CBN, serving as an ersatz archive in the absence of an actual National Film Archive - at time of writing the building has been mandated by the Philippines government but does not yet physically exist.

The first title I looked up was what I believed to be the Weng Weng western, Da Best In Da West (1981). As the U-Matic tape flickered to life on the archives' tiny TV monitor, there was the Philippines’ King of Comedy, Rodolfo Quizon, known to generations of adoring fans as Dolphy. Beside him was Lito Lapid, nephew of 60s cowboy superstar Jess Lapid Sr… and there was Weng Weng.

Da Best In Da West unveiled itself to be an elaborate two-hour spoof of Filipino westerns. Dolphy arrives at a town just as the sheriff is shot, and guns down the assassin, and is proclaimed hero and sheriff, all in one swift move. The reluctant hero sets off to clean up the town, and ropes in the two foot nine Bronson to be his deputy. Strictly an ensemble player here, Weng Weng has little to do other than provide a bizarre novelty backdrop, wear garish cowboy outfits, and gesture excitedly during the fight scenes.

Lito Lapid's stardom was less than three years old when he appeared in Da Best In Da West, one of Dolphy's most popular titles from the early Eighties. An elaborate two-hour parody of Hollywood and Pinoy westerns from Dolphy's RVQ Productions, it was the perfect vehicle not only for Lito Lapid to poke fun at his cowboy persona, but also for Dolphy to star for the third time alongside his diminutive sidekick. The film itself is a reworking of an earlier Dolphy western parody, also called Da Best In Da West (1967), and also directed by Romy Villaflor, in which failed gunfighter Dolphy becomes sheriff in a town where showgirl Divina Valencia's father, the former sheriff, was killed; Panchito plays Dolphy's deputy "Clint Eatwood".

Dolphy’s RVQ Productions released three to four films a year, but one would be its stand-out roadshow presentation. With Da Best In Da West, released in June 1981, Dolphy threw the entire weight of RVQ’s movie-making machine behind its bloated, gargantuan production. “It was a very expensive movie," recalled Dolphy, "because almost all of the villains from the history of making movies are all there. Paquito Diaz, Romy Diaz, Max Alvarado, so many others. [Eddie] Nicart, and all the goons of Lito Lapid. And I had my own goons as well! It was part of my comedy." Dolphy's fight directors Jay Grama and Fred Esplana play two of the Don's goons, and are joined by fellow SOS member Jun de Guia, while Ruben Ramos clashes fencing swords with Dolphy; Eddie’s team of Mando Pangilinan and Oscar Reyes, SOS Daredevils Jing Caparas, Avel Morado, Joe Cunanan, Romy Nario all make appearances. The goons are joined by Dolphy’s comic regulars: Teroy de Guzman, fake Chinese goon Er “Canton” Salazar, Amay Bisaya, Dely Atay-Atayan, comedy trio Tatlong Itlog, brother Georgie Quizon, and Don Pepot as Ifugao tribesmen… the list appears endless, making the film resemble at times the final evening in the Titanic’s casino and everyone’s desperately trying to cash in their chips.

"We were shooting in Baguio,” Dolphy told me of Da Best In Da West’s locations, “because it looks like a western place. At that time. Not anymore because there’s so many houses there. You can’t see the mountains anymore, there’s all residences there. And you can get some big horses in Baguio." Baguio is five hours drive north of Manila, nestled above the low-lying clouds at the beginning of the Cordillera mountain chain. A former enclave of artists and revolutionaries, it's now the tourist destination of Filipinos searching for a spot that's not as dirty, dank and tropical as the rest of the archipelago. Thus it's a constant ten degrees cooler and its tall European-looking pine trees are usually surrounded by mist, fog or drizzle. Naturally, Baguio has been utilized as an exotic backdrop for countless Tagalog features, doubling for Europe or the US in Cirio Santiago’s films and other international productions, a much-used location for Bobby A. Suarez, and convenient Ifugao exotica - Ifugao being the feathered former headhunters - for Dolphy. Baguio’s also known for its saloons (one, Baguio Country Sounds, looks like it’s straight out of a Clint Eastwood bar brawl), its country pickers, painted ponies, rolling hills, rock quarries, and the original ‘Baguio Cowboys.’ If Manila city slickers ever feel the urge for a frontier experience, Baguio’s idiosyncratic cowboys and injuns are just a relatively short bus ride away.

Towards the top of one of Baguio City’s facing hills is the Diplomat Hotel, originally a Dominican monastery in the 1800s before it became a hotel much favoured by visiting Americans. It was later taken over by a Faith movement who then rented it out to films such as They Call Her...Cleopatra Wong, and has been in ruins for over twenty years. Scanning the mouldering rooftops, my head was filled with visions of Bobby's moustache-clad nuns falling to their deaths in slow motion. I'm sure, somewhere amidst the slime-covered fountains and bombed-out rooms there's a metaphor for the Philippines film industry somewhere... Dolphy, too, utilized the Diplomat’s formidable exteriors as the villain’s hacienda, and Da Best In Da West ends with Lito Lapid making several leaps from the same roof as Bobby’s nuns onto its once manicured, now overgrown lawns.

The film starts with Dolphy riding through Marlborough Country singing a parodic medley of Western themes, playing travelling salesman Wild Bill Hika (hika is Tagalog for “asthma”) with his customary hangdog expression, droopy shoulders, pot belly hanging off his spindly frame, and knee-length red puruntong shorts, named after Dolphy’s character John Puruntong in John And Marsha. Bushwacked by a pair of thugs (one is our old friend from the first Tropical Hut meeting, Steve Alcarado), he’s robbed and buried up to his neck; Lito, as bounty hunter Dalton, rides in and rescues him. In turn, Dolphy saves Dalton from being strung up by his latest bounty, the notorious Tango Brothers - Max Alvarado, Rodolfo “Boy” Garcia and Max Vera as Tito, Vic and Joey. They both roll in Bronco Town where the corrupt mayor (Ben Johnson) is on the payroll of dastardly wheelchair-bound land baron Don Oligareon (Spanish-speaking mestizo villain Tony Carreon) and his violent, lecherous, whip-wielding son Facundo (a role played to the hilt by Romy Diaz) who has his eye on Estrelita (Nina Sara), leader of the local workers.

Dolphy heads straight to the local watering hole, where he spies the gorgeous Jane (Dolphy's Angels' Yehlen Catral) dancing to a disco version of “She’ll Be Coming Round The Mountain” with a male cowboy equivalent of the Hot Gossip dancers. Things heat up when one of the saloon goons gets overheated by all the disco, shoots the town’s sheriff during the scuffle. Dolphy inadvertently shoots the assassin, and before he knows it, he's wearing a Sheriff's badge, has a two-foot-nine Deputy named Bronson, and is being measured for a coffin by the town's undertaker (cadaverous comic goon Nonong de Andres often referred to as Bankay, or "Corpse").

Like clockwork, the Tango Brothers show up to cause trouble, but a hidden Dalton saves the day, while a cowering Dolphy tries to hide behind Weng Weng’s tiny frame. It’s the film’s only scene where Weng Weng fills the frame by himself or shares it with Dolphy alone; as Deputy Bronson, much of his screen time is spent as a background figure next to Bronco Town’s other inhabitants, although in his defence his colourful costumes – black with white tassels, an aqua Lone Ranger number, a white suit with speckled vest, and even a purple one – make him hard to miss. Romy Villaflor also frames Weng Weng strategically, sometimes in the foreground of a crowd scene, or conspicuously at its edge. In the jail house sequence, for instance, he sits on a desk grinning and mindlessly slapping a belt against his hand, then is then passed from one townsfolk to another before he’s deposited on the top of a filing cabinet. When Dolphy and Dalton serenade Estrelita in mock-Spanish, Weng Weng is out front, strumming away on a guitar that dwarfs him and threatens to crush him! At one point you can actually hear his real voice - as expected, child-like and even higher pitched than his vocal double in For Y'ur Height Only (1981).

Romance blossoms, first between Dolphy and Jane, then Dalton and Estrelita, and through Dalton’s help, the people of Bronco Town continue to mistake Dolphy for a hero – except for Jane. By then the next wave of goons under gun-for-hire Diablo (Paquito Diaz) ride in, beat up and shoot Dolphy and leave him for dead. Dolphy leaves town in disgrace, but is found by grizzled recluse and former bounty hunter Inkong Gaspar (Panchito, with grey hair and a massive Walrus moustache) and he teaches Dolphy how to shoot and fight with a sword - and makes a man out of Dolphy, before Dolphy shoots off Gaspar’s moustache and leaves him a broken man.

Dalton’s father (director and parodist Luis San Juan) is then beaten to death by Facundo, prompting the town to take up arms against Don Oligareon and his goon army for the finale’s regulation half-hour shootout. When Dalton discovers Estrelita is being forced at gunpoint to marry Facundo, he rides to her rescue. Ambushed by Facundo’s men at the pass, Lito conveniently discovers a half-built shack – and rides his horse though its floor-to-ceiling window in slow motion. "We had a hard time doing that," recalled Dolphy. "The horses, they stop. So what we did was put a plank, the horse runs over it… In one shot we blindfolded the horse, but the horse can sense this! But we got the shot OK."

“Those windows,” said Eddie, “it’s candy glass. I mix it myself. Even in America [during The Gunfighter shoot], when I made it, even my American counterpart could not do it, I was the one who mixed it, because I know how to do the clear candy glass, the resin. And when Lito did stunts, before, we use candy glass, the ones I mix. But now, it’s live. Candy glass cannot pass for the real thing any more, because the movie audience and the bystanders will boo you if you don’t use live (real) glass. That’s why I have lots of scars, here, when I broke the hospital glass - that’s where we passed through - because there were lots of bystanders [watching the scene]. They will criticize the stuntmen if they don’t see live action. And yes, after, they said that, Oh, that’s how the stuntmen do it. Even though there’s danger, they still go for it.

“And so that’s how it was with Lito. Even on horses. Before Lito mounts it, I test and ride it first. Especially if it’s a new horse. Because I don’t want him to get into an accident. And so I have to test the horse first, and then I report to Lito how it is - 'Here are the horse’s cues - when you ride it, it has to be like this…' So when [Lito] rides it, he’ll already know how to treat the horse. That’s how it is. You have to give him tips, and protection, because if he gets in an accident, the shooting will stop.”

The basic premise of Da Best In Da West – a coward and accidental hero becomes bona fide hero – is central to not only every Dolphy film but every Bob Hope or Buster Keaton vehicle, and as such is as old as the Baguio hills. Regardless, Dolphy trots out each western cliché like a proud kitten with a fresh kill, and STILL manages to inject his own personality into the material, and invents new bits of business: Dolphy’s backward firing pistol, for instance, and his ukulele gun, or the scene where he rigs up a ramshackle shower next to his horse and ends up pissed on… As with all low-brow populist comedies it’s a matter of taste, and you either buy into Dolphy’s time-worn schtick or reject it violently. Me, I’m a sucker for silliness, and this silly, all-star goon comedy romps amiably through its regulation two-hour running time, and the sight of Dolphy astride a plaster Baguio pony trying to make it buck never fails to bring a wry smirk to these jaded features.

Da Best In Da West was, by Tagalog cinema standards, phenomenally successful. "We were competing with the first Superman [more likely Superman 2] that was showing here," recalled Dolphy. "You would see people watching Superman AND Da Best In Da West!"