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Category: Elisse Joson

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Plot: masseuses by day, sexy government spies by night. It’s party time!

Filipino exploitation is alive and well. The old Charlie's Angels (1976-1981) recipe remains as popular and fertile as ever. Extra Service is both a straightforward action-comedy on the Charlie's Angels (1976-1981) (itself reimagined for the modern audiences in 2000 and most recently in 2019) model and a spoof of the spy-action genre in the vein of the amiable but ultimately futile D.E.B.S. (2004). Star Cinema went all out on this one attracting some of the most beautiful people in front of the camera and some of the best up-and-coming talent behind it. Savaged by critics and audience alike Extra Service has garnered a reputation as some of the worst Filipino cinema has wrought in recent years. This is the sort of thing that will make you long for the inoffensive vanilla exploitation that Mainland China has become a specialist in. Ostensibly described as a sexy action-comedy Extra Service effortlessly fails at all three

Apparently one of the tent pole releases for ABS-CBN Film Productions and their family-oriented subsidiary Star Cinema Extra Service comes brimming with young talent. The men behind Extra Service are Chris Martinez and Ronald Allan Habon. Martinez was the director of Kimmy Dora and the Kyemeng Prequel (2013) and Habon was the writer of The Super Parental Guardians (2016) or the highest-grossing domestic production in recent history. Starring Kapamilya sex bombs Jessy Mendiola (sometime Barbie Girl, fashion icon and FHM’s sexiest woman in the Philippines in 2016), Arci Muñoz and Coleen Garcia (each color-coded for your convenience) and for all female patrons there are Pinoy heartthrobs Enzo Pineda, Vin Abrenica and Ejay Falcon (most, if not all, take their shirt off at least once) Extra Service sports candy-colored production design redolent of the prime works of Luigi Cozzi and DOA: Dead or Alive (2006) and some of the most breast-centric costumes this side of Mainland China actioner Ameera (2014). Obviously aimed at the teen set and custodian to some of the most criminally unfunny comedy in recent years Extra Service is not only marred by bad action direction and laughable fight choreography, it features some of the worst CGI and visual effects that makes the average Sino webmovie look expensive. As such Extra Service is the complete antithesis of BuyBust (2018) and Maria (2019).

Aurora or Aw (Arci Muñoz), Emerald or Em (Coleen Garcia) and Geneviève or Gee (Jessy Mendiola) are former convicts who were incarcerated for individual crimes and now form a team of professional thieves. Aw has exceptional leadership skills, Em excels at combat and marksmanship and Gee has both the boobs and the brains. In prison they forge a bond with Beverly (Kitkat Bañas, as Kitkat) and her wrecking crew Daphne (Sunshine Teodoro) and Ashley (Star Orjaliza) but are forced to betray her when the government offers them a deal. The girls work as masseuses at the Touch Mahal Spa somewhere in Manila. To Lolly (Tessie Tomas) Aw, Em and Gee are just three fun-loving ditzes. One day the three are servicing mute Larry (Enzo Pineda) who literally hands them his briefs for a high-stakes infiltration mission to obtain a code. Kapitana (or Captain), Henya (or Genius) and Maldita (or Warfreak) spring in action and upon completing the objective they are recruited into the elite national-defense group F.O.T.A. (Filipino Organization of Top Agents) by hard-nosed L (Carmi Martin).

L informs the girls that Don José Mondragon (Jaime Fabregas) has arranged to marry off his son Pacquito (Janus del Prado) to Mari (Kim Molina), the daughter of head of Yakuza Doña Akira Suzumo (Arlene Muhlach). Neither party is particularly pleased with the decision as Mari is an empty-headed fashionista and Pacquito is flamboyantly gay. The marriage will consolidate the power of the Mondragon crime cartel over the Philippines and simultaneously allow the Yakuza access to the islands riches. Aw, Em and Gee are tasked to retrieve the three Perlas Ng Silangan (or the Pearls of the Orient), worth around $1 million each, from as many high-risk locations. The self-professed #SexySquad must infiltrate the high-security Mondragon stag party to obtain the Luzon Blue, enter the Miss Yakisobabe MMA contest (and come out alive) for the Visayas Red and penetrate the Mondragon-Suzumo wedding ceremony for the Mindanao White. Things are further complicated when during a mission sparks fly between Aw and Moises or Moe (Ejay Falcon), Em attracts the attention (and wins the affection) of PNP police officer Carlo (Vin Abrenica) and L’s nephew Larry falls madly in love with Gee – and each of the three lovers have the bad habit of showing up at the most inconvenient of times. F.O.T.A. has lined up the three Julia (Michelle Vito, Alexa Ilacad and Elisse Joson) as new recruits should the team fail. Will #SexySquad be able to overcome their personal hang-ups and complete their most dangerous mission yet?

The humor is puerile and juvenile for the most part, although there are a few things that gave us a good chuckle. First and foremost, the jokes start early with the character names. Say Aw, Em, Gee really quick and you get “OMG!” and the government agency the girls end up working for is called fota (which is really close to pota, or the Tagalog word for bitch). In true Cutie Honey (2004) fashion the girls will scream “it’s party time!” in unison at the start of every mission and the extravagant breast-centric costumes recall Naked Soldier (2012) and Ameera (2014) in equal measure. The Miss Yakisobabe MMA vignette briefly channels Kick Ass Girls (2013) but sadly Gee’s chest never ends up cushioning any blows or give her any advantage, tactical or otherwise. Speaking of which, there’s no equivalent to Frieda Hu Meng-Yuan (胡梦媛) or Pan Chun-Chun (潘春春) but Jessy Mendiola will make you long for Analyn Barro. The running gag involving L and her never-detonating smoke grenade will elicit a smile at first but very quickly wears out its welcome. The usage of phonetic English is ubiquitous in Asian productions – and it’s fittingly terrible here as well. The training mission allows Arci Muñoz to show off her acrobatic skill amidst some pretty awful CGI and it makes you wish she’d be offered a Mission: Impossible or The Expendables sequel. For a sexy comedy Extra Service always remains modest and even Fetching Nurses (麻辣俏護士) (2016) was sexier on average and the action direction was leagues better in Bring Me the Head Of the Machine Gun Woman (2012). If the concluding fashion montage is anything to go by than somewhere deep within Extra Service longs to be a bikini-centric Hawaiian spy-action romp in the tradition of Andy Sidaris. Unfortunately, that’s something Star Cinema would never allow under their general audience banner.

While Extra Service is pretty dire at least there’s the figment of a good idea here. In the hands of an experienced action director this could have been something good. Muñoz, Mendiola and Garcia obviously have chemistry – and it’s a bit sad that it’s wasted on something as vanilla as this. Given that in the half decade since no sequel materialized this is likely to remain a stand-alone feature. Perhaps within another 5 years the Extra Service brand can be reimagined and given the treatment it deserves. The credit montage with Muñoz, Mendiola and Garcia twirling around in their bikinis is worth the price of admission alone. Had this been produced under a different banner and gravitated more towards Naked Killer (1992) rather than Naked Soldier (2012) perhaps than it would be worth anything more than a casual mention. As it stands now its ill reputation isn’t unfounded. While this may never reach My Cousin the Sexologist (2016) levels of direness this should have been so much better than what we got. Regardless of how you might feel about it Extra Service conclusively proves that Filipino exploitation is alive and well. This is an entirely different beast than the exploitation from back in the halcyon days of Cirio H. Santiago, Eddie Romero and Bobby Suarez. Extra Service might not go that extra mile but it’s serviceable enough for what it is.

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Plot: vloggers travel to mysterious island and uncover terrible secret.

Now that the zombie wave following in the wake of The Walking Dead (2010-2022) is finally cresting some interesting outliers have been revealed. Whereas South Korea’s #Alive (2020) went for the introspective approach iZla channels the spirits of old grandmasters Cirio H. Santiago, Gerardo de Leon, Eddie Romero, and Bobby A. Suarez. At 85 minutes it thankfully is mercifully to-the-point and surprisingly clever when it wants to be (which doesn’t happen all that much, sadly). iZla lives (and dies) by its adherence to the exploitation maxim of the three capital Bs: babes, boobs, and blood. And it delivers just what it promises. iZla makes no qualms about what it is. A puerile and low effort romp that’s the closest to Raw Force (1982) as we’re likely going to get in this day and age. Barry Gonzalez must be aware of his country’s rich history in exploitation. Savaged by critics and detested by audiences alike iZla is unadulterated Filipino pulp horror at its best.

iZla opened domestically on 22 October 2021 and premiered internationally on Netflix about a month later. The cleverest thing about it is probably its title. Director Barry Gonzalez seems to specialize in swooning romances and comedies (or some permutation thereof) on both the big and the small screen. iZla appears to be his first foray into horror although here he retains the comedy that’s his comfort zone. Perhaps he had better focused on the romance because the humour here is painfully unfunny. Granted, iZla does work as a horror when (and if) it stops mucking about. Which doesn’t happen near as much as it probably should. Whether you find iZla funny is contingent upon your tolerance for crass and easy boob - and fart jokes. iZla never gets its head out of the female cast’s cleavage long enough to ridicule the inherent absurdities of cheap zombie horror plot contrivances and the tired conventions that come with it. iZla has plenty of story to fumble but not nearly enough to sustain what amounts to an +80-minute skit.

The year is 1942, World War II. The Japanese occupation of the Commonwealth of the Philippines has claimed several of its islands. One of these unnamed and unspecified islands armed forces mysteriously disappear into the blackness of the night by unseen assailants. Guarding the island are Japanese ninjas specialized in guerrilla warfare that the government simply dubs Ninja On Call or Ninja-Call. In the bowels below scientists have developed a serum rendering them impervious to injury and death. The locals soon believe the island to be cursed and the story of Forbidden Island becomes an integral part of native folklore. Decades pass and the legend of Forbidden Island lives on. Badong (Paolo Contis) and Entoy (Archie Alemania) are two orphaned slacker resort workers getting by on tips from odd jobs here and there. Not even the crippling debt they inherited from their absentee parents looming dangerously above them is enough to spring the unambitious and non-upwardly mobile duo into action. The two desperately need something to get out of the rut and the financial hole they’re in.

In Manila Veronica (Isabelle Daza), Valerie (Beauty Gonzalez, as Beauty Gonzales) and Venus (Elisse Joson), or the popular vloggers collectively known as the V-Sisters, are brainstorming ideas for their latest YouTube prank hit video. The sisters and their team - mascot Abi (Aiko Climaco), producer Gina (Sunshine Garcia) and researcher Lani (Analyn Barro) – are about to give up when they run into Badong and Entoy in the city of Kalimliman. Mayor Anding (Niño Muhlach, as Nino Muhlach) (who just so happens to be the V-Sisters’ uncle) has ordered a travel ban to Forbidden Island (whether it’s in the environs of Savage Beach, Warrior Island, or Taboo Island is, sadly, never disclosed) stirring the girls interest in the destination. Badong and Entoy figure that they might as well make a buck from the ditzy girls and brokers a deal with Veronica. The two agree to charter a boat and double as their guides/security detail. Things take a turn for the dark when the group discovers that uncle Anding has a marijuana plantation and his own para-military force. It’s then that the zombie ninjas break loose and left and right people fall prey to the maws and jaws of the undead. Will be Badong, Entoy, Lani, and Veronica be able to ward off the hungry undead long enough to figure out an escape plan?

It took writer Ays De Guzman (as Ice De Gusman) and 5 (!!) others to come up with a halfway coherent “story concept” that’s essentially the first half of Angel Warriors (2013) combined with the second half of Raw Force (1982). Really? That’s not even counting various scenes and plot elements lifted wholesale from Hell of the Living Dead (1980), Cross Mission (1988), Zombi 3 (1988), and After Death (1989). You halfway expect Yvette Yzon to do a cameo but iZla is never smart nor self-aware enough to capitalize on its collective legacy and multiple decades of domestic cinematic traditions. Writer Ays De Guzman and Barry Gonzalez commit to some Claudio Fragasso / Bruno Mattei level hackdom here. It’s perfectly okay if you mistook this for a spoof because iZla seems to operate on that mindset. More charitable and forgiving minds might call this a semi-comedic deconstruction but that’s giving this one far more credit than it deserves. Shaun Of the Dead (2008) this most certainly is not. Nor is it Anna and the Apocalypse (2017) for that matter. The cringe-inducing dialogue is both terribly written and helps nothing with exposition. What passes for humour alternates between fart and boob jokes almost exclusively and some situational slapstick would’ve worked wonders here. Since none of that will be forthcoming we’re stuck with characters either too dimwitted or self-absorbed and ditzy to be of any interest. No amount of boobage and gratuitous fanservice can camouflage writing this half-assed and bad.

And with a cast consisting of Filipino television staples Beauty Gonzalez, Isabelle Daza, Elisse Joson, Sunshine Garcia, and Analyn Barro there’s plenty to be had. These Pinay equivalents of Stephanie Herala or Mavis Pan Shuang-Shuang (潘霜霜), Frieda Hu Meng-Yuan (胡夢媛), and Pan Chun-Chun (潘春春) might not be the next Cristine Reyes, Fernanda Urrejola, or Anne Curtis but they acquit themselves good enough. For a movie centered almost exclusively around their shapes and forms they take it all in stride. The emperor might have no clothes but these babes staunchly remain in theirs. For something that tries very hard to be a throwback to the Golden Age of Filipino exploitation there’s an interesting duality to the way director of photography A.B. Garcia films the women. Garcia takes a near-porn level of interest in their curves but with this being a broad comedy and general audience release it shies away from any and all female nudity. Well, there’s plenty of female nudity but most of it is either implied or obscured by strategic props and such. For all the bounce and jiggle there’s precious little bang.

iZla only gains a faint pulse when it towards the end suddenly starts talking body temperature, asymptomatic carriers (of the zombie virus) and 14-day quarantines. Up to that point iZla had concerned itself superficially with mad science worthy of Blood Island (1959-1970), ninjas, and zombies and it’s absolutely the last thing for it to suddenly turn current and political. Yeah, iZla not only steals the Nazi zombie subplot from Naughty Dog’s Uncharted (2007) (completely with celluloid footage in a derelict lab with blood-splattered walls) and the ending from Hell of the Living Dead (1980) it actually has the gall to present itself as a parable or allegory of the ongoing global COVID-19 pandemic. Il faut le faire. It’s handled with all the grace, finesse, and intelligence of someone who considers a bowel movement the apex of humour. Horror movies, especially the sillier ones, often carry big themes or important messages. If there’s anything to compliment iZla on it’s the special effects work. This one is full of old school prosthetics and practical effects with an absolute minimum of digital post-production. Faint praise though that might be, there’s at least something it gets right. It might not be much but you got to take what you can with these sort of things. Here’s hoping Barry Gonzalez makes a full-blown female-centric action movie (preferably with Beauty Gonzalez, Analyn Barro or Elisse Joson) in the old Filipino tradition next.