PANOORIN PO NATIN ANG "THE KINGMAKER"
Ang movie na ito ang isa sa mga nagkumbinsi sa anak ni General Fabian Ver na humingi ng tawad sa mga victims ng Marcos government.
Ang una pong malinaw sa documentary na ito ay kung gaano macha-charm ni Imelda ang kahit sino. Maganda, madaming nanligaw, matindi ang tama ni Marcos sa kanya, aakalain mo, isang napakagandang love story.
Pero pag-isipan po natin ang inamin niya dito. Na mababasa niyo na consistent sa mga biographies niya na available (mga titles sa baba). Na hindi niya ginusto ang buhay ng isang political wife. Na dahil dun ay nagkaroon siya ng breakdown at kinailangang ipagamot sa US.
Until, she said, the only way to make Ferdinand Marcos Sr. happy was to fully embrace her role as the supportive partner of a man who was deeply decided to become president of the Philippines. So she decided to force herself to fit the role of a politician’s wife: being thankful for experiencing all that her role as a political wife entailed. Until she fully enjoyed her role.
But her role became bigger and bigger. Until she told herself she would be the mother of the nation. She even says she can “mother the whole world.”
And in her outsized role, she looked at herself as something beyond the limitations of what our country allows her to legitimately spend on—she would buy jewelries, clothes, access to royal gatherings, buildings and grand homes in New York and other U.S. cities. All because she needed to personify beauty, and beauty she equates with love. And that love she professes to pour out on her countrymen.
The people, especially the poor, need a “star in the dark night.” She was not about to bother finding out what that idolatry of beauty and her persona entailed.
And so she says: “perception is reality, truth is not.”
And we, the Filipino people, continue to suffer because in her mind, truth had no value. Only perception, no matter how contrived, mattered.
