Indis

In our world today, many things are changing. Now fortunately for us – mass com students – one of the most highly developed things known to man is the mass media – from text messaging to 10.5 mega pixel Digital SLR cameras. Everything! Because of this, is it safe to say that the people in the mass media industry should be the one’s who are educating the people in our country?

Everyone watches the movies. Everyone watches films and teleseryes and commercials. So that means the movie industry and the film industry, along with the television industry, should be the one’s who are actually educating our people, am I right? Filipinos – in particular – are now turning into a dim-witted race. The funny thing here is that our intellect, through the years, is exponentially deteriorating. Somebody should do something about this, and since the mass media is available to everyone, they should be the one’s who are reeducating our people, our nation, our homeland. Even some of our Government officials are stupid, what more are the poor, uneducated Filipinos living in the streets and begging for extra change?

In the Philippines, there is such a large amount of people who wholly support the Mainstream Filming industry – industries such as Viva Films, ABS-CBN, GMA, Star Magic, etc. The people in our country love these because of the actors and actresses playing the leading roles of the characters in the movies and because of the themes such movies possess (even if the theme has been used over and over and over again). But the question here is that if they learn anything from them, anything critical or anything that shows them the truth about many things around them? Maybe they do, but not as much as they should. Mainstream movies have very shallow themes and very little educational and academic information. They’re all entertainers, and not educators. Shouldn’t the media be a medium of educating others? Shouldn’t it be able to express more educating than entertaining? In the filming industry, the real target of the artists, directors, producers and staff is to be able to entertain the public, so that they can capture their attention, and to educate, once the attention is in the palm of their hands. They have to be able to teach good morals to those people in our country and not just show us how Aga Mulach and Anne Curtis Fell in love in a Beach, or how Vhong Navarro Got to be Lasticman. Love is not a lesson to be taught, isn’t it? Isn’t a thing like love something that is taught to us by the world itself, by our experiences in life and by the trials and failures we have made?

In independent Films, they tackle more serious topics about the world around us, and the events that are happening in our country – may it be a current issue or otherwise. In these films, they aim to really educate the people and to entertain them as well. They have their target market and they try to really capture them, but unfortunately, they don’t get to always get what they want. Independent films have deeper and more serious issues in their content. They try to show the lessons in ways that are obvious and at the same time entertaining.

So should we balance the support between the mainstream and independent movies? No! We should actually turn the tide. Because the strength of the mainstream now is so impenetrable that even if we support both at an equal level, the mainstream will still be the one which the people will prefer to watch.

There are so many good independent films in our country. They may not have actors and actresses as good as those in the mainstream industry, but the things they try to get across are very well thought of, factual and honest.