Customer Reviews

Colma: The Musical

5 star:		(6)
4 star:		(6)
3 star:		(3)
2 star:		(1)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

There's a simple emotional acuity at the heart of this 2007 coming-of-age musical. True, at a poverty row budget of $15,000, it has the production values of a direct-to-hotel porn movie, but first-time director Richard Wong and first-time screenwriter, songwriter and co-lead H.P. Mendoza manage to make something substantive from the tired premise of three close friends just out of high school and still reeling from painful romantic breakups and experiencing the social alienation that makes their respective roads to self-discovery bumpy ones. The acting feels stilted and the music rather derivative, but the film somehow makes it to the finish line through its honesty about how life is for social outcasts living in San Francisco's suburban necropolis. It's all the more forgivable for the enthusiastic effort that shows.

Shot on digital video in the real town of Colma, the movie opens with the three leads singing the Rent-inspired rave-up, "Colma Stays", which describes the anonymous small town with clever imagery. Lanky Jake Moreno plays Billy, the most inchoate of the trio, an aspiring actor who not only lands a sales job at the mall (Serramonte for all you SF locals) but also a supporting role in a local community theater production. He can't seem to get over his ex-girlfriend much to the chagrin of not only a smitten fellow actress but also close pal Maribel. With a cheery spark masking an uncertain melancholy, the cherubic L.A. Renigen makes party girl Maribel the earthbound glue holding the trio together just barely. Her shining moment comes with "Crash the Party", a dead ringer for Blondie's "Dreamin'", preceded by the film's funniest moment, a frozen-stare purchase of alcohol with fake IDs similar to the liquor store scene in Superbad.

The most challenged and challenging character is Rodel, played with studied deadpan by Mendoza. Rodel is a gay poet and slacker, closeted from his traditional Filipino father and increasingly jealous of Billy's ability to move on with his life. He provides the film's most painfully realistic moments, as well as the most lacerating lines. Yet, his plaintive rendition of "One Day (Pt. 2)" provides genuine heart to the story's climactic moment. Not everything is wondrous. Moreno's nasal vocals, which make him sound like Bert on Sesame Street, get wearing for the repetitive monotone. The barroom shanty scene runs too long, especially in ¾ time, and the "Deadwalking" duet between Renigen and Mendoza is marred by the arty Bergmanesque intrusion of ghostly couples dancing in the cemetery. The 2007 DVD offers a few surprising extras given the film's low budget - an infectious and insightful commentary track from Wong and Mendoza and fifteen minutes of deleted and extended scenes that were wisely excised from the final cut. Definitely a worthy first effort.

We saw "Colma The Muscial" 3 times in the theater -- it was that good! Loved the catchy tunes (still listen to the CD regularly) and moving story line. Anybody who is a Bay Area local will appreciate the inside jokes, but even if you aren't.. you will enjoy this if you like musicals and are looking for something just a little different. Get it!

I saw this movie in theatrical release - it is completely awesome! Great songs, great acting. Hilarious, bawdy, real and stylized. An AMAZING accomplishment for the filmmakers. Bought the CD too. Now it's time to buy the DVD.

Whatever you do - see this movie!

Saw this in it's limited release. Loads of fun, great songs. Modern coming of aging movie. Talked to some college kids and they thought it was right on target. Give it a shot, you will not be sorry.

I thoroughly enjoyed this film. Very simple premise: three friends--two guys and a girl, one guy is gay and they've recently graduated from high school--live in Colma (just outside of San Francisco) and hang out together and break into song now and then. The musical score by H.P. Mendoza (who also wrote the film and stars as the gay character) is what makes the film so unique. The songs are catchy and fun and a joy to listen to. And the young cast (Mr. Mendoza, Jake Moreno and L.A. Renigen) sing them with such energy, it's infectious to watch. I fell in love with this movie, and I hope you do, too. I can't wait to see what Mr. Mendoza does next.

If you like 'Musicals'! if you like a 'Querky' sence of humor! and if you love the younger cross culture sound of music!!!.! You'll just love this 'Colma'-nation of coming of age, growing wiser, and growing apart; together. It's the ultimate in smalltown living near big cities, only fitting in in a halfassed sort of way. You'll enjoy following this threesome in a 'Menage Tios' into individual futures.!!!

What would it be like to grow up in a town where the dead outnumber the living by a ratio of more than a-thousand-to-one? That's the case with Colma, a working-class community located just south of San Francisco that is more notable for its vast cemeteries than for anything related to the folk who actually live there. Dubbed The City of the Dead, Colma has a population of around 1500 above ground but over a million-and-a-half below, with roughly 75% of the town's land given over to tombstones and gravesites. That hardly seems the ideal setting for a movie musical, but then "Colma: The Musical" is not your average, run-of-the-mill, afraid-to-take-a-risk movie. Thankfully.

Three of the live people who call Colma home are Billy (Jake Moreno), an aspiring actor who`s so straight-arrow he`s never even had a drink; Rodel (H.P. Mendoza, who also co-wrote the screenplay), a gay prankster who fears coming out to his traditionalist dad; and Maribel (L.A. Renigen), a fun-loving free spirit, who often has to serve as mediator between the two guys. Recently graduated from high school, these three best buddies suddenly discover themselves on the brink of adulthood, trying to find their way in the world and wondering what the future holds for them.

Like a modern-day "Umbrellas of Cherbourg," "Colma: The Musical" is a cinematic operetta in which the characters define their relationships and express their feelings almost entirely through song. The score by Mendoza is lively and bouncy - if a trifle redundant at times - with lyrics that capture the fears and yearnings of the teenage heart with uncanny accuracy. In addition, this stylish and stylized movie features appealing performances, an endearing sense-of-humor, a hint of surrealism, and an artful use of that rarely employed, but often highly effective, tool of cinematic grammar, the split-screen.

With its youthful exuberance and anything-goes audaciousness, this quirky, independent feature has much of the feel of experimental regional theater about it. And the fact that it's still a trifle rough around the edges only adds to its authenticity and charm.

Filled with amusing and touching insights into this wonderfully complex and exciting thing we call "growing up," the movie understands the paradox that Colma, like all hometowns, serves both as the soil to plant one's roots in and as the place to break away from when the time is right. That's the lesson that these three likable young people learn in the end - just as the countless others, now residing in those graveyards, learned before them.

This short indie musical was filmed in my hometown, so to see, understand, and know what this film is singing about is uncanny. I don't think I've enjoyed a musical like this since Little Shop of Horrors.

Movie is hilariously funny, stoned. I would definently reccommend you take a toke before you watch. With that said the movie follows the lives of three seniors ups and downs during the duration of a school year.

Having lived in Daly City, and attending Westmoor high for a year back in the day, I had to see this movie. I was cautiously optimistic and this film exceeded my expectations. I wish there was a PG-13 version of this however so I could allow my daughter to watch it. The film had many "small budget" moments but quite enjoyable over all.