Summer is on! This means it’s time to hit the beach and get that to-die-for golden tan or go on a summer escapade to some exotic location in or out of the country with you family and friends. To add to the fun of the sizzling summer season, SM Cinema--the largest film exhibitor in the country--releases four SM Cinexclusive films for moviegoers.
To kick off the month of April, SM Cinema releases two back-to-back SM Cinexclusives on April 10. Bad Romance is a romantic love story turned suspense thriller. It tells the story of a lonely hotel receptionist, Andrea (Mercedes Cabral), who works in an isolated hotel owned by Mr. Eduardo Villapando (Rey PJ Abellana). The businessman is being hunted by a detective named Jeboy Macaraig (Aiza Seguerra). Andrea is at the point in her life when she’s ready to find that perfect love. After a passionate night of love with a TV and movie star, Sam Lloyd Pascual, she thinks she has found the one. When Andrea gets dumped by Sam Lloyd Pascual (Francis Lopez), all hell breaks loose, putting everyone around her in grave danger.
Anime fans also have much to rejoice about this summer with the April SM Cinexclusive, Road to Ninja. The story picks up what happened sixteen years previously when the Nine Tailed Demon Fox was released by a masked Ninja. The village of Konohagakure was close to ruins after the Nine Tailed Demon Fox attacked the village. In order to save the village, Minato Namikaze and his wife Kushina Uzumaki sealed away the demon inside their newborn son, Naruto Uzumaki, an act that cost them their lives. Fast forward to the present: The peace in the village of Konohagakure is disrupted when members of a dreaded organisation called the Akatsuki attack. Naruto launches a successful counter-attack against the group but wonders why a group that was thought to have died a long time ago is alive. He also feels loneliness at the thought of not having anyone at his side to celebrate the victory. At that same moment, the masked man makes his appearance in Konoha, and his dōjutsu attack both Naruto and Sakura. Mysteriously, Naruto and Sakura are transported to a new world inhabited by everyone they ever knew but seem to be acting differently than their normal selves, including Naruto’s parents who happens to be alive in that world.
(CLICK HERE to read PEP's review of Naruto: Road to Ninja)
Bayang Magiliw is another local film to be screened exclusively in all SM Cinemas as part of the SM Cinexclusives for the month of April. This film revolves around the controversial reproductive health issue. Magiliw is a town in Quezon considered to be the most densely populated place outside Metro Manila. The town’s mayor is a hardcore womanizer who has secretly fathered dozens of illegitimate children. A baby boy, the town mayor’s youngest illegitimate child, ends up in the hands of an affluent elderly couple, who in turn gives him to their daughter, a corporate lawyer based in Manila. The trouble starts when the mayor finds out that the baby boy is his illegitimate child. Meanwhile, he puts an OB-Gyne in jail for prescribing contraceptives to the women of Magiliw. The Doctor and the Corporate Lawyer unite to rid the town of the offensive town mayor. The film stars Wendell Ramos, G Toengi, Jackie Lou Blanco, Arnold Reyes, Tony Mabesa, and AJ Dee.
The fourth Cinexclusive offering is Spiders 3D, a sci-fi thriller that will truly be enjoyed by everyone. When a Soviet space station malfunctions in outer space, it breaks apart and falls into a New York City subway tunnel. During the inspection, a horde of mutated spiders is discovered in the wreck, which eventually causes chaos and destruction to New York City.