Feeling
conflicted about the War on Drugs? Erik Matti is about to raise even more
concerns regarding the way it is prosecuted in the Philippines. It is surely no
accident his latest film is one of several recent Filipino releases that calls
into question the methods used to enforce justice in the Duterte era, but there
is no time for politics in this action showcase. It is a kill-or-be-killed struggle
to survive in Matti’s BuyBust (trailer here), which had its
world premiere at the 2018 New York Asian Film Festival.
Nobody
is more skeptical of the Philippine Drug Enforcement Agency (PDEA) top brass
than Agent Nina Manigen. She is already the sole survivor of a disastrous
operation that wiped out the rest of her previous squad. Even though she is considered
a jinx, Bernie Lacson recruits her for his new squad. Unfortunately, their
first field op bears a striking similarity to the notorious bust-gone-wrong
Manigen barely survived. The idea is to grab the uber-protected drug kingpin
Bennie Chen in mid-transaction, using Teban, a reluctantly cooperating narco middle
man as bait. The operation needs to be fast and clean, because the entire
walled off slum is under the control of the drug lord.
Alas,
Lacson’s operation is betrayed by Judas, the same mole in the PDEA responsible
for the massacre of Manigen’s first team. Trapped in the slum, Manigen and a handful
of colleagues will have to fight pretty much everyone as they search for an
escape.
Basically,
BuyBust is like The Raid: Redemption, but set in a shanty village instead of a
tenement. However, Matti’s film, considered his first straight-up action movie,
is far grittier and fiercer. Frankly, the body count here is astronomical and
many of the deaths are spectacularly brutal. Arguably, Manigen and her valiant
colleague Rico Yatco qualify as heroes, but there is not a lot of heroism in
the film. They do some grisly things to survive, but they do not have much choice.
Fans
will probably be stunned by Anne Curtis’s steely, hardnosed action-turn as
Manigen, but she truly reinvents herself here. It is hard to imagine just about
any other glamorous leading lady who could duke it out so convincingly amid all
this muck and detritus, including Atomic
Blonde’s Charlize Theron (maybe Kim Ok-vin from The Villainess).
Yet,
as Yatco, Brandon Vera is right there with her, every step of the way. In fact,
they develop some terrific fighting chemistry together (but in a film like
this, terms like “relationship” are meaningless). Victor Neri’s Lacson is also
a seriously bad cat, while Alex Calleja steals a few scenes as the rather
reasonable (and comparatively decent) Teban.