The movie starts with a barbaric scene at a slaughterhouse. Workers gut live hogs that are hung upside down from their hoofs, squealing. My gawd the squealing. Blood everywhere. Hogs getting skinned, boiled, run through grinders. I practically became a vegetarian right then and there.
Then the opening credits roll. And what unfolds for 90 minutes, give or take, is a movie where humans who are metaphorically hanging by their hooves in grinding poverty yell, fight, spill blood and act unimaginably cruel to one another.
Insiang is the beautiful daughter of a miserable middle-aged woman whose husband ran off. Town stud Dado moves in with the old lady but he's got eyes for Insiang just like every other boy in town. The boys are all lazy, gambling alcoholics with zero prospects. Dado is hardly any better.
Eventually Dado r3pes Insiang, who runs to one of the boyfriends to be consoled. He takes advantage of her vulnerability by taking her to a seedy motel and penetrating her.
Insiang has hit rock bottom. What follows is a tale of revenge that Shakespeare's audiences would have loved.
I got a little restless in the second act waiting for them to move the plot along. I was getting a little worn out by the harpy mom. But the third act is so much depressing fun that you forget about the flabby middle.
The uncompromising final scene fits perfectly. This is definitely not Manilawood.
