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Serbis

Play trailer Poster for Serbis R 2008 1h 31m Drama Play Trailer Watchlist
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79% Tomatometer 29 Reviews 52% Popcornmeter 500+ Ratings
A struggling family (Gina Pareño, Jaclyn Jose, Coco Martin) owns a Filipino porn theater where prostitutes conduct their business.

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Serbis

Serbis

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Critics Consensus

This darkly comic family drama finds ways of being viscerally graphic and intellectually stimulating at the same time.

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Critics Reviews

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Liam Lacey Globe and Mail While it has its gag-inducing moments, director Brillante Mendoza's film about a three-generational family that lives in and operates a rundown porn theatre is more sweet than twisted. Rated: 3/4 May 22, 2009 Full Review Wesley Morris Boston Globe Part-telenovela, part outlandish screwball comedy, part soft-porno, but completely without a road map, Serbis evokes Pedro Almodóvar, Tennessee Williams, and 1940s and '50s Hollywood. Rated: 3.5/4 Feb 26, 2009 Full Review Jonathan Curiel San Francisco Chronicle Serbis has the feel of a documentary, but a documentary can't accomplish what "Serbis" does: Take us to a corner of the world where sex and regret are so intimately entwined. Rated: 4/4 Feb 20, 2009 Full Review David Walsh World Socialist Web Site There's a concentration on the immediate and the detail, and the larger social picture is entirely missing, so one is irresistibly drawn to the conclusion that the rot of Filipino society is the fault of the ordinary Filipino. Feb 13, 2021 Full Review David Harris Spectrum Culture Serbis, though humorous at times, suffers from Mendoza's wanton vagueness. Rated: 2.5/5 Oct 3, 2019 Full Review Mattie Lucas From the Front Row Mendoza's roving camera captures his characters strife and pain with an unblinking eye. Rated: 3.5/4 Jul 7, 2019 Full Review Read all reviews

Audience Reviews

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Georgan G This film seemed more like a documentary than a drama. Getting to see all the members of this big family negotiate their problems was interesting enough. With all the nudity & soft porn it was downright entertaining. Rated 3.5 out of 5 stars 08/25/23 Full Review Audience Member story of a family trying to run a restaurant & porno theater ironically called family theater Rated 2.5 out of 5 stars 01/21/23 Full Review Audience Member the movie paints a good enough picture of the character and the desperate situations they are in, but then what? the plot (or lack thereof) doesnt move any of these characters forward. someone please give the director a crash course on what a story arc is. Rated 2 out of 5 stars 02/14/23 Full Review Audience Member Brilliant movie, showing the hectic life of a disintegrating family in the town of Angeles in The Philippines. They are running a cinema showing soft-porn movies, which is only an excuse for providing the local prostitutes and thiefes and other ungraceful professions with a place to meet their clientele. Obviously, no family can live in that environment without being adversely effected by it. Despite all that madness and repeating pattern of failures generations after generations, I think there was a somewhat positive ending, a dim chance of a better future, of a united family. The camerawork and the storytelling is amazing. Most of the scenes take place within the walls of the decrepit movie theatre but the boundaries between professional and personal events, street life and private life, day and night are rather blurred. Sometimes claustrophobic, sometimes disgusting, sometimes graphic, but this is Philippine or World cinema at its best. Rated 5 out of 5 stars 01/16/23 Full Review Audience Member This is going to be a modern classic...black comedy and the works... Rated 4 out of 5 stars 02/24/23 Full Review Audience Member An artistically filthy movie, engaging to the other side of Filipino culture... Truly perfect in the way the actors deliver their characters and the atmosphere of the film is just classic and enduring... Rated 5 out of 5 stars 01/20/23 Full Review Read all reviews
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Cast & Crew

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Brillante Mendoza

Director

Gina Pareño

Nanay Flor

Jaclyn Jose

Nayda

Coco Martin

Alan

Kristofer King

Ronald

Dan Alvaro

Jerome

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Movie Info

Synopsis A struggling family (Gina Pareño, Jaclyn Jose, Coco Martin) owns a Filipino porn theater where prostitutes conduct their business.
Director
Brillante Mendoza
Producer
Ferdy Lapuz
Screenwriter
Armando Lao
Rating
R (Language|Sexual Content|Nudity)
Genre
Drama
Original Language
Filipino
Release Date (Streaming)
Sep 27, 2017
Box Office (Gross USA)
$64.4K
Runtime
1h 31m
Sound Mix
Dolby
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