Diwata Ng Karagatan (1936)

1936 - Diwata Ng Karagatan/"Fairy Of The Ocean" (Parlatone Hispano-Filipino)

[Release date 6th February 1936; released in France and Belgium as "Ligaya, Fille des îles" ("Ligaya, Girl Of The Islands") and "Wong, Le Tyran" ("Wong, The Tyrant")]

Director/Writer Carlos Vander Tolosa Producer Jose Nepomuceno

Cast Rogelio de la Rosa, Mari Velez

From Nick Deocampo's Facebook post (images courtesy of Nick): 

IMPORTANT NEWS!!! OLDEST FILIPINO FILM PRODUCED BY PIONEER JOSE NEPOMUCENO FOUND IN BELGIUM

A national film treasure has just been found! A copy of Diwata Ng Karagatan, long-rumored to be existing but not found, has finally been located at the Belgian film archive. Using my personal money to buy a plane ticket to go to Brussels, Belgium from Berlin, I linked-up with the daughter of a pioneering Ilonggo-language film director, Louise Baterna, to liaise with the Cinémathèque royale de Belgique in finding the film. Happy to announce, the film's been found!

On October 28, we found ourselves watching the only-known  existing copy of the vintage movie being played on a Steenbeck editing machine. We were accommodated at the venue by Hugo Mestdagh, coordinator for digital film collection and restoration. The film exists only in a 35 mm print, as no copy has yet been digitized ever since a nitrate original was deposited at the archive by the now-closed Belgian film laboratory CineLabor in 2016.

The film’s 1936 provenance dislodges the claim earlier held by the 1937 Fernando Poe Sr-starrer, Zamboanga, as the oldest Filipino pre-World War II movie, a film that I also discovered abroad while on a Fulbright-funded research scholarship at the Library of Congress in 2004. 

The Tribune, 14th January 1939, p.6

Diwata Ng Karagatan’s appearance is undeniably historic in many ways. Produced in 1936, it will mark its 90-year history next year. After its first screening that year, it was re-premiered in 1939 to celebrate its successful exhibitions abroad. During the intervening years, the film was exported to France and it also had screenings in Belgium and South America. It appeared to be in popular demand in France as the film was released several times in different titles. The most popular of the titles was Ligaya, fille des îles (Ligaya, Girl of the Island). Another was, Wong, Le Tyran (Wong, The Tyrant), referring to the film’s evil nemesis. Since after its last exhibition at Fox Theater in Manila, nothing has been heard of it until the war broke out in 1941. All movies in Manila disappeared with the war. Thankfully, a copy of the film has now been found abroad.

What makes the discovery of this film doubly historical is that this is the first and perhaps the only film that is extant that was produced by the Father of Philippine Cinema, Jose Nepomuceno. Despite rumors of some films attributed to Nepomuceno to be existing, none of his films has ever been found.  

The newly-discovered copy is certifiably Nepomuceno’s, produced by his pioneering film studio, Parlatone Hispano-Filipino. It is a film he produced but not directed. Instead, it was directed by another pioneering figure, Carlos Vander Tolosa, the same filmmaker who directed the first films to open the movie studios, Sampaguita and LVN, in the Thirties. Diwata Ng Karagatan, shot and released in 1936, preceded both movies as Sampaguita’s Bituing Marikit was shot in 1937 and LVN’s Giliw Ko was made in 1939. 

The two films are among the only four (or five?) known feature-length films that survived the war, including Ibong Adarna, Tunay na Ina, and Pakiusap. This is sad considering the scores of films that were made before the war. The film Zamboanga held its reputation as the oldest among them since 2004 when I brought home a copy. This record has now been broken with the discovery of Diwata ng Karagatan.

The reason why it was difficult to find Filipino films in foreign film archives may surprise many of us. It was because of film piracy. This malpractice was rampant even during the early film days. Diwata ng Karagatan fell victim to this unscrupulous practice when a copy presumably owned by a French distributor was re-edited and later released in the French-speaking market. It was claimed to be a French production, which it was not. 

The film was cut down to its present running time of only 52 minutes from a possibly longer version by a French film promoter, a certain Gabriel Pallu. In claiming the film to be a French production, scenes in the film were jumbled, with some elements now missing, and all the names erased of the Filipinos credited to have made the film (including the producer Nepomuceno and the director Tolosa). Their names were substituted by French names, further claiming the film to be a musical romance film. A French voice-over narration could be heard (no narration in the original), while luckily the Tagalog dialogues have been preserved. Louise Baterna and I found it heartbreaking to find only a long black leader at the end of the film where names of Filipinos once appeared in the closing credits. The ending was all blacked-out while the theme music continued to play. This was evidently a clear case of filmic and cultural erasure.

No credit could also be found of the actors, as the film was claimed to be a “documentary” of some exotic South-sea natives, a popular topic in the Thirties. It is of the same genre as Zamboanga, also carrying the same South-sea romance theme. The country where the film was shot (the Philippines) was also left unknown. Identifying the two leading actors now, the male lead was played by the young Rogelio de la Rosa, and the female lead was played by Mari Veles. The antagonist, the sinister Wong, remains unknown, as with the other actors whose names still need to be identified. 

The discovery of the film may be seen as an archaeological film find or a detective film work but just the same it was a major coup in finding the old Filipino movie. With Manila totally devastated during World War II, and with no archive to store films then, it is lucky that a few films still remain to be found in foreign archives. A similar incident happened with the finding of the pioneering Ilonggo feature-length movie shot in 1977, also discovered in Belgium. The rare film was Ginauhaw Ako, Ginagutom Ako (I Am Thirsty, I Am Hungry), a film co-directed by Leonardo Belen and Quin Baterna, starring Susan Henson and Rosemarie Gil. The producer’s daughter, Louise Baterna, turned to be an ideal partner as she was instrumental in snatching her father’s film from historical oblivion. The film was later digitized by the Philippine Film Archive. Without Louise’s local support and facility in the French language, I would not have done everything in two days, considering I had no financial or logistical support but my retirement money from UP.

Still, until now, no real effort has been made to find Filipino films abroad. My effort is a personal one driven by my love for Philippine cinema and fueled by my scholarly interest in Filipino film history. Who would be crazy enough to jump on a plane using personal funds to go to Belgium without fully knowing if a copy of the film was there? But the gamble paid off.  A national film treasure has been found! 

PHILIPPINES - initial screenings at the Lyric Theatre in Manila from 6th February 1936, at the Fox Theatre from February 15th, and at the Queens Theatre on 25th and 26th February.

Following its successful sale to France and (according to Manila newspapers) South America, the French edit was screened at the Fox from 17th to 19th January 1939.

HAWAII - initially screened at the Empire in Hilo, Big Island on 8th to 9th January 1937, with Atang de la Rama's live stage show. The film was subsequently distributed throughout the Islands via Consolidated Amusements:

- 2nd March 1937 - Wahiawa Theatre

- 9th March 1937 - Palama, Honolulu

- 15th March 1937 - Ewa Theatre

- 17th March 1937 - Waipahu Theatre

Unlike all film copies in the Philippines, Consolidated's print survives World War 2, and continues to screen until the early Fifties:

- 22nd February 1946 - Aala, Honolulu

- 16th September 1946 - Palama, Honolulu

- 20th October 1946 - Palace, Hilo

- 22nd September 1947 - Palama, Honolulu

- 5th May 1949 - Roosevelt, Honolulu

- 16th June 1949 - Mamo, Hilo

- 1st May 1952 - Mamo, Hilo

USA - Consolidated's print takes a tour of California with at least two screenings, possibly many more, as most Tagalog programs went unannounced in the English-language newspapers:

- 21st April 1948 - Rio Theatre, Soledad

- 28th April 1948 - Globe Theatre, San Pedro

FRANCE - released under several different titles, "Ligaya, Fille des îles" ("Ligaya, Girl Of The Islands") and "Wong, Le Tyran" ("Wong, The Tyrant"). See Nick Deocampo's above article for more details.