Lino Brocka

Brocka began his film career in 1970 by directing commercial genre films after a stint in theater and television. He first gained critical acclaim with Weighed But Found Wanting (1974) and Manila in the Claws of Light (1975), the latter of which is considered the greatest Filipino film of all time. Insiang (1976) was the first Philippine film to screen in Cannes Film Festival, followed by his other films Jaguar (1979) and This Is My Country (1984). Other notable films include Bona (1980), Cain and Abel (1982), Macho Dancer (1988), and Orapronobis (1989). While most of his films have critiqued the dictatorship of Philippine president Ferdinand Marcos and his wife Imelda Marcos, Brocka became politically active in his later years. Brocka died on May 22, 1991, in a car accident. He was posthumously declared a National Artist of the Philippines in 1997.

Brocka was born on April 3, 1939, in Pilar, Sorsogon. He was the first of two children of Regino Brocka and Pilar Ortiz. Brocka's father worked as a boat builder, was politically active, and was married to a schoolteacher. While on a trip to the province of Nueva Ecija, Regino met Pilar, then 15, and deserted his family to live with her on an island off the coast of Sorsogon. After Lino was born out of wedlock, Regino was charged with bigamy by his legal wife and was sentenced to two years at Muntinlupa Prison (later New Bilibid Prison) in Metro Manila, during which Lino's younger brother Danilo was born three years later. After Regino was released, the family returned to Sorsogon. Regino became a defining influence in Brocka's early life. Lino later recalled: "I have vivid memories of my father because I had a very good, very, very happy childhood. The island was like that in Blue Lagoon, the film which starred Jean Simmons." When he was six, Regino was killed in a suspected political murder. Faced with the prospect of raising her children alone, Pilar sought help from her family in San Jose, Nueva Ecija, where she left Lino with her sister. Lino suffered abuse from his aunt for four years until he ran away to live with his mother, who later became an elementary school teacher. To make a living, Lino and his brother sold sampaguita necklaces at the public market, where he would sing a song and let his tears fall on cue, enticing the audience to buy the necklaces. Brocka later depicted his childhood experiences in his 1977 film Tahan Na Empoy, Tahan. Brocka graduated from Nueva Ecija High School in Cabanatuan in 1956. He initially studied law at the University of the Philippines Diliman as a scholar, but later became a working student after losing his scholarship. Brocka applied at the drama club under Wilfrido Ma. Guerrero, but was rejected due to his thick accent and short height. Undeterred, he studied Hollywood films and learned how to speak in English until the drama club hired him as a stagehand. Brocka first met future activist Behn Cervantes through the drama club. Cervantes introduced him to Mormon missionaries in 1961. Brocka dropped out of college, converted to Mormonism and went to Hawaii for a two-year mission. After finishing his missionary commitments, he attended the Mormon Church College of Hawaii for one semester. Brocka briefly stayed in the San Francisco Bay Area, where he worked as a bus boy and hospital orderly before returning to Manila in 1968 due to homesickness.

Brocka wrote press releases for a production company that filmed B movies in the Philippines. He was then introduced by Cervantes to Cecile Guidote-Alvarez, founder of the Philippine Educational Theater Association (PETA). Brocka established his career with PETA, where he ran errands, wrote scripts, and led theater exercises until he became a director of several episodes of PETA's TV show Balintataw. In 1970, Brocka was approached by a producer with Lea Productions about making his first feature film. He wrote and directed Wanted: Perfect Mother, a musical based on the comics serial by Mars Ravelo. It won Best Screenplay at the 1970 Manila Film Festival. Brocka's next film, Santiago!, was a war film starring Fernando Poe Jr. and featured PETA actors in minor roles and as extras. He won the Best Director Award from Citizen's Council for Mass Media (CCMM). His third film in 1970, Tubog sa Ginto, starred Eddie Garcia as a closeted homosexual and was based on another Ravelo comic serial. An early landmark of LGBTQ representation in Philippine cinema, the film won Brocka the Best Director award at the 1971 FAMAS Awards. The following year, Brocka co-wrote and directed the showbiz drama Stardoom, which won him the Best Director award from CCMM. He also directed the romance drama Cadena de Amor in the same year, which won seven prizes from the Manila Film Festival. The musical Now! (1971) and the romance drama Cherry Blossoms (1972), partly shot in Japan and starring Nicholas Hammond, opened to negative reviews. Brocka directed a total of nine films, six of them for Lea, until 1972, when he went on a self-imposed hiatus. He continued working for PETA and taught classes in film, drama and speech. Two years later, he established the production company Cinemanila, vowing to create substantive films. "There’s too much fantasy in the movies, too much escapism," he said. "Philippine films are wanting in content; they need more realism." For Cinemanila's first film, Brocka returned to filmmaking with Weighed But Found Wanting, released in 1974. Shot on location, it starred Christopher de Leon in his first film role and was written by Mario O'Hara, who also played the leper Berto in the film. Weighed became a box office success and earned Brocka another Best Director award at the 1975 FAMAS Awards. It also led Mike de Leon, whose family founded LVN Pictures, to approach Brocka about adapting the novel In the Claws of Brightness by Edgardo M. Reyes, with de Leon as producer and cinematographer and Clodualdo del Mundo Jr. writing the screenplay. The result, Manila in the Claws of Light (1975), starred Bembol Roco in his first film role and was also shot on location. It won nine awards at the 1976 FAMAS Awards. Brocka achieved international success with the film, which has since been considered the greatest Filipino film of all time and ushered in the Second Golden Age of Philippine Cinema. Brocka's next film, Insiang (1976), starred Hilda Koronel as the titular character and Mona Lisa as her mother. The film faced censorship issues after First Lady Imelda Marcos objected to its depiction of the slums in Tondo, Manila, although her daughter Imee Marcos helped sponsor the film's domestic premiere. Insiang became the first Philippine film to be screened at the Cannes Film Festival, where it was placed in the Director's Fortnight section in 1978. It would later be considered one of Brocka's masterpieces. In 1978, Brocka directed the comedian Dolphy as a gay beautician in Ang Tatay Kong Nanay, which became a commercial success and earned critical praise for Dolphy's performance. Brocka made four films in 1979. Init starred Charito Solis, Rio Locsin, and frequent collaborator Phillip Salvador and was recut by censors for its sexual content, followed by Ina, Kapatid, Anak, a family drama starring Solis, Locsin, and Lolita Rodriguez. Jaguar, a neo noir crime film starring Salvador, was written by Pete Lacaba and Ricky Lee from the nonfiction story "The Boy Who Wanted to Become Society" by Nick Joaquin. It became the first Philippine film to compete for the Palme d'Or at the 1980 Cannes Film Festival. American film critic Andrew Sarris praised the film: "The most pleasant surprise of the Festival so far has been Lino Brocka’s Jaguar, a socially conscious film noir from, of all places, the Philippines.” Jaguar won Best Picture and Best Director at the 1980 FAMAS Awards, while also winning five Gawad Urian Awards. Ina Ka ng Anak Mo was Brocka's first of three collaborations with Nora Aunor.

In 1980, Brocka collaborated with Aunor on two films, Nakaw Na Pag-ibig and Bona, the latter of which was screened at the 1981 Cannes Film Festival as part of the Director's Fortnight section. Also in 1980, Brocka reunited with Hilda Koronel and screenwriter Pete Lacaba on the rape revenge film Angela Markado, based on the comic serial by Carlo J. Caparas, which won top prize at the 1983 Three Continents Festival at Nantes, France. In 1981, Brocka directed the film noir Caught in the Act, starring Salvador and Lorna Tolentino. Brocka's 1982 action drama Cain and Abel was written by Ricky Lee and starred Christopher De Leon and Phillip Salvador as two warring brothers inspired by the titular characters from the Bible. In the same year, Brocka directed the sex comedy Palipat-lipat, Papalit-palit, depicting a love triangle between a couple (played by De Leon and Dina Bonnevie) and a homosexual (played by Mark Gil), and the romantic thriller PX, starring Koronel and Salvador. In 1984, Brocka directed the political crime film This Is My Country from a screenplay by Lacaba. Co-financed by French and Philippine production companies and starring Salvador and Gina Alajar, it premiered at the 1984 Cannes Film Festival, where it competed for the Palme d'Or, but faced a legal battle with the local censors before its domestic release. In the same year, Brocka directed the domestic drama Adultery from a screenplay by Jose Javier Reyes, starring Vilma Santos and Salvador, and the thriller Experience, co-written by Lacaba and Roy C. Iglesias and starring Snooky Serna. In 1985, Brocka directed the political coming of age film Miguelito: Batang Rebelde, starring Aga Muhlach in his first dramatic role. Released seven months after This Is My Country, it was more commercially successful than the latter and won awards. Brocka responded to the film's reception: "I cannot help it if I say I won for the wrong film when I won for Miguelito and not Kapit [My Own Country]...Because they missed the whole point of how I, as a director was trying to do Kapit." In 1986, Brocka directed Napakasakit, Kuya Eddie, a family melodrama based on the song by Roel Cortez and inspired by the economic crisis at the time. He also served as a jury member at the 39th Cannes Film Festival. In 1988, Brocka directed the musical drama Natutulog Pa ang Diyos, starring Gary Valenciano, and TV commercials for the Royal Tru soft drink. He used his earnings from these projects to fund his passion project, the erotic gay drama Macho Dancer. It first premiered at the 1988 Toronto International Film Festival to a positive reception, and its North American release led to the creation of the film distribution company Strand Releasing. However, it was heavily censored for its domestic release in January 1989, with Brocka smuggling an uncensored 35mm print to the Museum of Modern Art. In 1989, Brocka directed the political thriller Orapronobis, his last film with Salvador. It was inspired by the then-ongoing vigilantism against suspected Communists in the Philippines. Orapronobis premiered at the 1989 Cannes Film Festival and was released in French cinemas as Les Insoumis and internationally as Fight for Us. Variety regarded the film as "perhaps even more violent and angrier than the films he [Brocka] made under the Marcos dictatorship." Brocka faced attacks from chief of censors Manuel Morato, who withheld the permit for the film's domestic release in part due to its subversive content.

In the last two years of his life, Brocka directed the political melodramas Gumapang Ka sa Lusak (1990) and Sa Kabila ng Lahat (1991) for Viva Films. Both films starred Dina Bonnevie and became critical and commercial successes. Brocka died six days after the premiere of Sa Kabila ng Lahat. His final films released after his death include the melodramas Kislap sa Dilim, starring Christopher de Leon, Lorna Tolentino, and Gabby Concepcion, and Makiusap Ka sa Diyos, starring De Leon, Concepcion, and Ruffa Gutierrez. In 1990, Brocka contributed to the UNICEF-produced anthology film How Are the Kids? with the seven-minute segment "Oca", about child labor in the fishing industry. The film also included segments by Jerry Lewis and Jean-Luc Godard.

In 1988, Brocka was in talks to adapt Bienvenido Santos's short story collection Scent of Apples (1979). The following year, he was also slated to direct a biopic of South African boxer Arthur Mayisela titled The Basement, to be shot in Zimbabwe as a French and British production, until it was shelved by Columbia Pictures. Before his death, Brocka planned to direct Misererenobis, a follow-up to Orapronobis in a planned trilogy of films about human rights set during and after Marcos's presidency. He was also scheduled to start filming Huwag Mong Salingin ang Sugat Ko, a modern interpretation of Jose Rizal's novel Noli Me Tangere written by Ricky Lee, in Palawan; it was later completed and released in 1991 with lead actor Christopher De Leon credited as director.

In the early 1980s, Brocka lobbied with the film and arts community to protest the planned expansion of censorship laws, leading to the formation of the Free the Artist Movement in 1983, later renamed to Concerned Artists of the Philippines. He also became a vocal critic of First Lady Imelda Marcos. After the assassination of opposition leader Benigno Aquino Jr. in 1983, Brocka recalled his reaction: "That was the turning point for a lot of people. It shocked the country. The moderates, the silent, the indifferent were so shocked; it brought us together." He joined the executive committee of Justice for Aquino, Justice for All and helped organize political rallies, some of which were later shown in This Is My Country. On January 28, 1985, Brocka and Behn Cervantes were arrested during a nationwide jeepney strike. They were charged for organizing an illegal assembly and denied bail, although they both stated that they were attending in sympathy with the drivers. They were released after 16 days. Brocka joined the Coalition for the Restoration of Democracy after his release. In 1986, after President Marcos was ousted and exiled at the end of People Power Revolution, Brocka was appointed by his successor Corazon Aquino to the 1986 Constitutional Commission to help draft a new constitution. He resigned after four months, citing his disillusionment with the commission's realpolitik approach, although he contributed the phrase "freedom of expression" into the constitution's bill of rights. Three years later, Brocka criticized the Aquino government in a press conference for the Cannes screening of Orapronobis, stating: "We are still facing the same problems today. There is poverty, hunger, corruption, repression and ongoing human rights violations, none of that has changed even though now we enjoy a democratic space." Before his death, Brocka campaigned for the removal of U.S. military bases in the Philippines.

Brocka was openly gay and declared his homosexuality in Christian Blackwood's 1987 documentary Signed: Lino Brocka. On May 22, 1991, Brocka and actor William Lorenzo left the Spindle Music Lounge, where they watched a show starring Malu Barry, in a 1991 Toyota Corolla driven by Lorenzo and heading home to Tandang Sora Avenue in Quezon City. At around 1:30am, the car crashed into an electric pole along East Avenue after Lorenzo tried to avoid a tricycle in their path. Both Brocka and Lorenzo were rushed to East Avenue Medical Center, where Brocka was pronounced dead on arrival, while Lorenzo suffered leg injuries but later recovered. Brocka was buried with his mother at Himlayang Pilipino Memorial Park in Tandang Sora Avenue, Quezon City.