Director Patricio Ginelsa returns with yet another food-driven film, “Lumpia with a Vengeance” (2020). Ginelsa first skyrocketed to fame with his Filipino-American home video-made-cult-classic, “LUMPIA” (2002). Here, highschoolers fight off bullies with the help of a lumpia (Filipino eggrolls)-wielding superhero. This much-beloved flick ushered in its crowdfunded sequel today, featuring UFC fighter Mark Muñoz and longtime actors like Danny Trejo. “Lumpia with a Vengeance” is now making its festival rounds, winning the Audience Award at the Hawaii International Film Festival and a continental premiere at CAAMFest in April.
Lumpia with a Vengeance is screening at Asian American International Film Festival
In this year's sequel, the stakes are much higher. This time, gang wars seep into the sleepy suburbs of Fogtown, a fictional US city with a majority-Filipino population. Here, local dealers have devised a way to make the humble eggroll into an addictive (and smokeable) drug. On the flip side, Rachel (April Absynth), a high school student, tries to raise money for her parents' much-belated wedding. By way of fate, she meets Kuya (Mark Muñoz), the local vigilante who throws his rolls for justice. They soon find that their lives are more connected than they thought in this tangle of fraud, opiates, and baked goods.
The film is exciting. It's also messy. But like an eggroll, the stylized editing serves as a hollow shell to unify its disparate elements. Each character is given a posterized comic-strip-like introduction, where their bolded names pop up against a splash of screentone. Comic-book like caricatures loaded with action lines clash with camcorder flashbacks. Slow motion and special effects dominate each fight scene. Most noticeably, Muñoz's resounding crunch finishes off each scene — effectively whetting the audience's appetite for some fresh lumpia.
As crafty as the editing seems however, the general filmed content remains bland. While “LUMPIA” embraces camera-recorded home video out of necessity, “Lumpia with a Vengeance” goes the extra mile to include internet home video a la Youtube. This does not bode well. The digital references don't resonate, but not because they're not old. Memes feel painfully inserted into the edits, and sudden pauses for emphasis feel tacky. The script's own attempt to be “relevant” also seems to prevent the older actors from delivering their lines with conviction. Only Rachel — easily one of the younger characters in the film — seems to smoothly go along with the dialogue, mostly due to her age. Sometimes I wonder if I simply am not the target audience for this film: not for my own ethnic background, but for not being Gen-Z.
There's an overreach at visual amateurity, as well. The white balance is off the charts. Sometimes, the lighting jumps from one camera shot to the next in controlled, indoor scenes, washing the characters in different tones. This is particularly evident around the dinner table – where it seems like the editors try to overcorrect this problem with higher contrast. For all the love and attention given to the editing, the camerawork feels lazy, if not a weak attempt at more home video aesthetics. All of this rolled into one makes the film feel more like a painfully long YouTube video, if not a “hot mess.”
It's a shame then, that “Lumpia with a Vengeance” wrestles so much with its prequel. It struggles to take on its own identity as it continues to pay tribute to its past self. From vigilantes to drug wars to a long-awaited marriage, the film incorporates enough disparate elements to keep up the energy — but one has to wonder if it's an adrenaline worth keeping for almost 2 hours of your life.
“Lumpia with a Vengeance” will show again in NYC at the Philippine Center at the Consulate next week at the Asian American International Film Festival.
