Imelda (2003)

Director:

Ramona S. Diaz

Release Date:

12 September 2009 (Japan)

Genre:

Documentary | Biography

Tagline:

Power, Myth, Illusion

Plot:

A "beyond the shoes" documentary on the former first lady of the Philippines, Imelda Marcos. |

Plot Keywords:

First Lady | Shoes | Imelda Marcos | Philippines | Marriage

Awards:

2 wins & 1 nomination

Cast

Imelda Marcos	...	Herself
Ferdinand Marcos Jr.	...	Himself
Imee Marcos	...	Herself
rest of cast listed alphabetically:
Stephen Bosworth	...	Himself
Phil Bronstein	...	Himself
Behn Cervantes	...	Himself
Rudolfo Cuenca	...	Himself
Josie Vergel de Dios	...	Herself
Conrado de Quiros	...	Himself
Katherine Ellison	...	Herself
Christian Espiritu	...	Himself
Richard Holbrooke	...	Himself
Eva Estrada Kalaw	...	Herself
Jose F. Lacaba	...	Himself (as Pete Lacaba)
Letty Locsin	...	Herself
Jo-Ann Maglipon	...	Herself
Carmen Guerrero Nakpil	...	Herself
Bernice Romualdez Ocampo	...	Herself
Sergio Osmena III	...	Himself
Vicente Paterno	...	Himself
James Reuter	...	Himself
Llewellyn White	...	Himself

Runtime:

USA:103 min

Country:

Philippines

Language:

Filipino | English | Tagalog

Color:

Color

Certification:

Philippines:G | Singapore:PG | USA:Unrated

Filming Locations:

Philippines

Company:

CineDiaz

Trivia:

Initially, Imelda Marcos opposed the public showing of this film in the Philippines and even got a Temporary Restraining Order (TRO) from a local court stopping it's public showing. Eventually she allowed the showing of the film on the condition the director dropped the word "Documentary" from the film.

Alternately laugh out loud funny and stomach turning...

Superb documentary on the hugely entertaining (her loopy theory of the cosmos and galactic order alone is worth the price of admission), absolutely appalling, diamond and shoe collecting former First Lady of the desperately poor Philippines. Apparently, Marcos attempted to block the doc's release in her home country, and one can see why. However, as she gets to speak throughout, she wasn't able to claim her words were taken out of context or that she was slandered. Happily for film-goers, her efforts to suppress the film failed. Documentarian Ramona Diaz combines archival news footage and interviews with Marcos sycophants, relatives, former employees, supporters and political opponents to present a very balanced and revelatory portrait of this truly ghastly woman, the epitome of small-town ambition run amok. Indeeed, this could be a biography of dictators anywhere. Having lived several years in the former Zaire during the era of the megalomaniac bandit Mobuto Sese Seko, I felt a thrill of recognition while watching the antics of the Marcoses. A needlepoint cushion on a sofa in Marcos' Park Avenue penthouse, one of her several international real-estate holdings, sums her up: "Better Nouveau than not Riche at all". In a chilling coda that proves people get the government they deserve and do not seem to learn from the past, Marcos' son and daughter win municipal elections and appear to be launching little political careers of their own.