MANGKOKOLUM!

Mental cramps DAILY rental for a house where a local television series may be shot runs from P15,000 to P50,000—quite a windfall for a homeowner whose abode grabs the fancy of a shooting location scout, ever on the lookout for settings that breathe chic, opulence, taste… maybe a certain ambiance or energy that hums and thrums in such living spaces. Or, maybe that which the late Third Reich mystic Karl Haushofer referred to as lebensraum , “living space” that had fueled the Nazi hunger for geographic expansion: “Space is not a vehicle of power. It is power.” The viewing fare jabbed like splinters into the eyes-- and minds-- of audiences trot out characters that, uh, they don’t belong to such spaces. They neither dwell nor live there. Somehow, those cardboard characters betray dysmenorrhea in demeanor, terminal spinal fractures of speech that limn muddled marshy mindset, aah, even cockroach sensibility and paralytic sensitivity. In short, they’re no better than zombies. Claims statesman...