Hinulid (The Sorrows of Sita) was one of the entries at the 2016 QCinema International Film Festival (QCinema) Circle Competition. It is about a grieving mother who tries to hold on to her religious devotions while struggling to accept the tragic death of her son.
Poet and filmmaker Kristian Cordero, from the Bicol region, teamed up with superstar Nora Aunor, another Bikolano, to flesh out the story of Sita Dimaiwat, a steadfast Roman Catholic who lost her son in an incident in Manila.
Sita, an overseas Filipino worker, travels back to Bicol carrying her son’s ashes. In mourning, Sita proves that memory is stronger than justice and that even the most broken life can be restored and healed.
Cordero shares that the movie took off from Carlos Ojeda Aureus’ story, The Night Train Does Not Stop Here Anymore.
“Aureus’ stories have moved me in many, many ways and I would always return to his works of fiction, which I consider a living spring of inspiration. I got so moved by his characters because I felt a certain and acute sense of closeness to them because his stories are all set in Naga,” he explains.
Cordero adds, “His stories revolve around people who are very familiar to me. I see and encounter them. These are priests, old bachelors, battered wives, and colegialas who, at a certain point in their lives, undergo a crisis of faith.”
He shares that some of the elements used in the movie were drawn from the Aureus fiction, including the Bicol-bound train where Sita rides; the Catholic upbringing; the mother-son parallelism akin to the Mary-Jesus relationship; the lessons in astronomy; and the discussions about evil versus good and why evil happens to good people.
But, Cordero still made the movie by introducing his own story that shows fragments of indigenous mysticism and folk religion.
“My point of intervention in the story can be found in the narratives of the Tolong Hinulid, Tandayag, and La Muerte.’ In a way, Hinulid (The Sorrows of Sita) is a tribute to Aureus and at the same time, I would like to experiment how our Bikol stories in poetry and in fiction can reach certain points of convergences, arrivals, and departures. Like Aureus, I am also an ex-seminarian,” he says.
Tolong Hinulid refers to the three statues of the dead Jesus Christ that are housed in Gainza, Camarines Sur. According to some reports, these religious icons were discovered individually in a river in Bicol.
In the Bikolano folklore, the “Tandayag” is a monstrous wild boar that was vanquished by the hero, Baltog.
“La Muerte” is a folk saint that personifies death. The powers of this saint are often associated with protection, healing, and the peaceful passage to the afterlife of devotees.
Cordero says that Sita’s role was inspired by the story of Naty Angeles, one of the main characters in the Aureus fiction.
“Like Naty, Sita lost her only son in a very tragic incident. Like Naty, Sita will undergo a crisis, a moment where she has to reckon with her faith and fears,” Cordero says.
In Cordero’s story, Sita has to come to terms that tragedies spare no one and that even the most pious is not exempted from feeling the pain of living in a broken world.
He says, “Sita must come to realize that the death of her son does not exclude her but will unite her with all other forms of tragedy and atrocities. In a way, this is very Marian, as she ponders everything in her heart.”