Erwin Romulo, the late Alexis Tioseco’s best friend, recalls the events after the critic and his girlfriend Nika Bohinc’s untimely death in their home in Quezon City. Diaz makes use of one long take to allow Romulo an uninterrupted narration of the events. The pain of recalling is palpable.
An imaginative telling of the story of a Vietnamese American mother-daughter duo who, in their attempt to heal the rift between them, reenact and satirize scenes from celebrated Vietnam War films while depicting a diasporic reality. Two inventive storylines complicate The MOTHERLOAD to levels of absurdity. Both of these glide in and out beneath the narrative backbone of Jessca and Kim’s personal story, and reflect the stunning disconnect between the Vietnamese diaspora and the world’s understanding of their presence.
