Cleaners (2019): Analyzing Glenn Barit&rsquo;s Way of Navigating Familiarity and Nostalgia Through Visual Treatment, Aesthetic, and Space-Time Relations in the &ldquo;New Normal&rdquo;

Zandra Mae  T.  Beo,; Raiza  A. Masculino,; Celina Mae  M.  Medina,

Cleaners (2019): Analyzing Glenn Barit’s Way of Navigating Familiarity and Nostalgia Through Visual Treatment, Aesthetic, and Space-Time Relations in the “New Normal”

Zandra Mae T Beo | Raiza A Masculino | Celina Mae M Medina

Discipline: Essay

Abstract:

Three years have passed since the onset of COVID-19. Now, the world is slowly shifting towards a post-pandemic routine, the ‘new normal.’ Consumer behavior, workplace practices, learning styles, and lifestyle habits have changed and will never be the same. In this paper, we suggest how Cleaners can be viewed as a post-pandemic film that would benefit from being reintroduced to the Filipino masses. We explain how Cleaners effectively utilizes film language to create a visual simulation of the Filipino high school experience and how all those elements led to making a chronotope where Filipinos can go back and reflect on their pre-pandemic life—hanging out with friends until dawn without stressing about losing their face masks, going to prom without overthinking how many people you have come into contact with, or casually visiting your sick classmate’s house just because they caught the ordinary flu. In this paper, we frame how and why Cleaners, a film that tells a series of bittersweet tales and ends with a glimmer of hope that shows how people find solace in one another even on the gloomiest of days, deserves a nationwide commercial run.

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