Colma: The Musical (2006) User Reviews

No-Budget Coming-of-Age Musical Reflects a Worthy First Effort

[EUyeshima · 6/10 · 17 March 2008]

There's a simple emotional acuity at the heart of this 2007 coming-of-age musical. True, at a poverty row budget of $15,000, it has the production values of a direct-to-hotel porn movie, but first-time director Richard Wong and first-time screenwriter, songwriter and co-lead H.P. Mendoza manage to make something substantive from the tired premise of three close friends just out of high school and still reeling from painful romantic breakups and experiencing the social alienation that makes their respective roads to self-discovery bumpy ones. The acting feels stilted and the music rather derivative, but the film somehow makes it to the finish line through its honesty about how life is for social outcasts living in San Francisco's suburban necropolis. It's all the more forgivable for the enthusiastic effort that shows.

Shot on digital video in the real town of Colma, the movie opens with the three leads singing the "Rent"-inspired rave-up, "Colma Stays", which describes the anonymous small town with clever imagery. Lanky Jake Moreno plays Billy, the most inchoate of the trio, an aspiring actor who not only lands a sales job at the mall (Serramonte for all you SF locals) but also a supporting role in a local community theater production. He can't seem to get over his ex-girlfriend much to the chagrin of not only a smitten fellow actress but also close pal Maribel. With a cheery spark masking an uncertain melancholy, the cherubic L.A. Renigen makes party girl Maribel the earthbound glue holding the trio together just barely. Her shining moment comes with "Crash the Party", a dead ringer for Blondie's "Dreamin'", preceded by the film's funniest moment, a frozen-stare purchase of alcohol with fake IDs similar to the liquor store scene in "Superbad".

The most challenged and challenging character is Rodel, played with studied deadpan by Mendoza. Rodel is a gay poet and slacker, closeted from his traditional Filipino father and increasingly jealous of Billy's ability to move on with his life. He provides the film's most painfully realistic moments, as well as the most lacerating lines. Yet, his plaintive rendition of "One Day (Pt. 2)" provides genuine heart to the story's climactic moment. Not everything is wondrous. Moreno's nasal vocals, which make him sound like Bert on "Sesame Street", get wearing for the repetitive monotone. The barroom shanty scene runs too long, especially in ¾ time, and the "Deadwalking" duet between Renigen and Mendoza is marred by the arty Bergmanesque intrusion of ghostly couples dancing in the cemetery. The 2007 DVD offers a few surprising extras given the film's low budget - an infectious and insightful commentary track from Wong and Mendoza and fifteen minutes of deleted and extended scenes that were wisely excised from the final cut. Definitely a worthy first effort.

charming coming-of-age musical

[Buddy-51 · 7/10 · 20 June 2009]

What would it be like to grow up in a town where the dead outnumber the living by a ratio of more than a-thousand-to-one? That's the case with Colma, a working-class community located just south of San Francisco that is more notable for its vast cemeteries than for anything related to the folk who actually live there. Dubbed The City of the Dead, Colma has a population of around 1500 above ground but over a million-and-a-half below, with roughly 75% of the town's land given over to tombstones and gravesites. That hardly seems the ideal setting for a movie musical, but then "Colma: The Musical" is not your average, run-of-the-mill, afraid-to-take-a-risk movie. Thankfully.

Three of the live people who call Colma home are Billy (Jake Moreno), an aspiring actor who's so straight-arrow he's never even had a drink; Rodel (H.P. Mendoza, who also co-wrote the screenplay), a gay prankster who fears coming out to his traditionalist dad; and Maribel (L.A. Renigen), a fun-loving free spirit, who often has to serve as mediator between the two guys. Recently graduated from high school, these three best buddies suddenly discover themselves on the brink of adulthood, trying to find their way in the world and wondering what the future holds for them.

Like a modern-day "Umbrellas of Cherbourg," "Colma: The Musical" is a cinematic operetta in which the characters define their relationships and express their feelings almost entirely through song. The score by Mendoza is lively and bouncy - if a trifle redundant at times - with lyrics that capture the fears and yearnings of the teenage heart with uncanny accuracy. In addition, this stylish and stylized movie features appealing performances, an endearing sense-of-humor, a hint of surrealism, and an artful use of that rarely employed, but often highly effective, tool of cinematic grammar, the split-screen.

With its youthful exuberance and anything-goes audaciousness, this quirky, independent feature has much of the feel of experimental regional theater about it. And the fact that it's still a trifle rough around the edges only adds to its authenticity and charm.

Filled with amusing and touching insights into this wonderfully complex and exciting thing we call "growing up," the movie understands the paradox that Colma, like all hometowns, serves both as the soil to plant one's roots in and as the place to break away from when the time is right. That's the lesson that these three likable young people learn in the end - just as the countless others, now residing in those graveyards, learned before them.

Colma stays, a crash the party fun movie.

[ironhorse_iv · 7/10 · 4 May 2013]

First-time director Richard Wong and first-time screenwriter, songwriter and co-lead H.P. Mendoza manage to make a great low-budget coming to age musical that is better than a lot of the big Broadway musicals. The movie follows three close friends on their journey from high school to their journey to self-discovery. The movie opens with the song 'Colma Stays', which describes the small town as nowhere ville. It's even funnier when you had live there, like me, but Colma is nowhere like 'small town'. It's pretty much now connected to Daly City, and South San Francisco. It's does change. It's only 20 minutes away from San Francisco, but the filmmakers made it seem like it's Colma is far from nowhere cool and there isn't anything to do. It's no way, cut off from the world. Still, there is more dead people than alive people in Colma. Anybody who is a Bay Area local who live South Bay will appreciate the inside jokes, but the movie is a bit limited due to that reason. The only people that can related to the film is a small group of people that live near or close by of the town of Colma. Billy (Jake Moreno) is the an aspiring actor who can't get over his ex-girlfriend, while not seeing that a fellow actress Tara (Sigrid Sutter) is smitten with him as well as his close pal Maribel. (L.A Renigen). Maribel seems the character that rarely has much going for her, besides partying. She's not that interesting of a character. She's a bit annoying, and snobby. The only highlight of the film was her singing 'Crash the Party' which is awesome non cut one take musical number. Not only is it, a great song that sounds similar to Blondie 'Dreamin', but the way they film it is amazing how they did without one mistake. While, Maribel has barely a character, Rodel (H.P Mendoza) has too much of it. Rodel is a gay slacker, who get beaten by his traditional Filipino father and increasingly jealous of Billy's ability to move on with his life. I love how the camera puts a black line between them in the laundry scene, making two boxes. He always complaining, yelling, making fun or in negative mood. It's makes you wonder why the other people even hang out with him. Seeing how he wrote the screenplay, the story follows way too much of him. Sadly, he can not sing as well. It felt repetitive monotone. Honestly, none of the actors can sing that well, but H.P Mendoza is pretty awful. I do like H.P Mendoza making fun of people that party way too much with the song. "Could We Get Any Older". Thank you, Mendoza. I wish I had the guts to say that to certain people in my life. I love the fact that the characters define their relationships and express their feelings almost entirely through song. Other songs that were pretty good are 'Tara', and "Goodbye Cupid or Goodbye Stupid'. 'Goodbye Cupid' was pretty funny drunk bar song. I do like the Hulk Hogan look a like guy at the bar. It's weird in a way, that everybody there, sounds like a Muppet character there. 'Deadwalking' was a interesting song with people dancing over people's graves. It's a beautiful song, but it's seems kinda disrespectful for those people who were buried there to be filming a musical there. It's does show what Colma is known for. I don't like "One Day' and 'Mature', it's just sounds like any slow normal karaoke song. The acting isn't that good. The characters can be pretty obnoxious and unlikeable. Still, it was funny how mean-spirited they can be. The language can be a bit harsh. Not all the locations in Colma: The Musical were in Colma. The Theater was located in San Francisco Mission Distract. The Cafe scene was on Ingleside neighborhood in SF. The Lincoln Park Market is in Clement St, San Francisco, CA. where they get fake IDS. It's was kinda funny, in a way, because in 2012, the place was busted for lottery fraud. I kinda wish they use more of Colma. Colma: the Musical is a great watch, for fans of musicals, or people that know the area. Even if you're not from Colma, you should give it a try.

A delightful surprise

[marcslope · 7/10 · 13 January 2014]

Flawed, certainly, but a bracing and energetic evocation of disaffected youth, and one of the most assured live-action musicals of the decade. This study of three young friends trying to escape dead-end futures in a dispiriting San Francisco suburb tracks along the same themes as, say, the Broadway musicals "Spring Awakening" and "American Idiot," but it's much less monotonous about conveying its theme of oh-I'm-so-young-and-sad-nobody-understands- me. And the soundtrack is varied and clever, the best musical moment being the "Cupid" number, the closest thing we'll get in 2006 to a great production number. Jake Moreno isn't the greatest actor, and the cinematography is muddy, and the idea that these three are living among the dead isn't sufficiently developed--we don't know how literally to take it. But writer-songwriter-actor H.P. Mendoza is clearly a very, very talented young man, and he catches familiar themes of youthful angst in fresh ways. And L.A. Renigen is a completely convincing wonderful-best-friend. All three kids are persuasively made up of good and bad traits, and we keep rooting for them even when they screw up. Made for nothing, it's an invigorating little movie, and at the end, when the credits thank "the town of Colma," you do get the impression that the whole town rallied behind these gifted young people to make their dreams come true. It's a nice feeling.

Deeply, DEEPLY unimportant, but still fun!

[dathaler · 8/10 · 1 July 2007]

OK, as a Bay Area resident (albeit a transplant) and indie film maven, I couldn't stay away from seeing this film. I'm considerably older than the characters and I didn't grow up in the Bay Area so I didn't relate to the story (or maybe it was just the mediocre acting, which was overshadowed by the excellent singing). Still, I thought this movie was a guilty pleasure, kinda like your favorite Mexican restaurant or greasy spoon--you know you shouldn't, but you're glad you did.

Part of what makes this film fun is its foray into camp. Some of the musical numbers were just too over the top. Billy's musical declaration of love for "Tara" would have been sweet were it not for the two guys in the background scaling the facades of the buildings and each other. The real topper is where Tara releases the band holding her hair back so the breeze'll catch it--except she's got short hair and it hardly works. It's hard to take this seriously, particularly when you realize that Billy and Tara first met at a party where Tara's operatic "Is someone in the bathroom?" is responded to by Billy's "I'm taking a sh!!!!!!!t." The camp factor is equally present in the songs we see during the performance of "Friend Joseph" (some sorta spin-off of "Pal Joey"?), a show in which Billy performs. It's just "quirky quirky quirky, so damn quirky, quirky quirky...."

I guess it's a bit of a cinematic love letter to the area--there's even a shot of Maribel reading a book nearly every San Franciscan will recognize. I was at a screening that was followed by a Q&A with the director and one of the cast--there's a sequel in the offing if this is well-received. For some reason, I can't wait to see it. :-)

We All Have Had A Colma In Our Lives

[IamGel821 · 9/10 · 20 July 2006]

Colma is a suburb of San Francisco where the dead outnumber the living. That's the running joke anyway. Known for its grave sites and "Daly City fog", Colma is the foundation for director Richard Wong's feature film debut, aptly titled "Colma: The Musical." Written by the talented H.M. Mendoza (who also supplies his talents to the songs, score and lead character), "Colma: The Musical" is a refreshing, funny and poignant independent musical ("independent musical" - is this the first?). It's amazing how Colma's entertainment value equals that of classic Hollywood musicals seeing as how it's missing all the elements that made those classics great. Production design, lavish costumes, an epic story and intricate choreographed dance numbers are nowhere to be found. What it lacks from the classics, it makes up in creating a new type of musical. A musical of simplicity, where the story is relatable, the characters real, the direction artistic without being artsy and, most importantly to a musical, the songs memorable.

The story of "Colma: The Musical" focuses on three friends trying to figure out life after high school. Billy, a "thezpian", is torn between two things: his new, going-nowhere job that he "really needs for something big" and his aspiring acting career; and new possibilities with "girl's name that's always on his mind" and his ex who he can't quite get over. Rodel is a poet trying to find "his happy place" after a break up with his boyfriend and a turbulent change in his already strained relationship with his father. His thoughts he writes on scraps of paper and his friends are the only things that keep him going. Maribel is the centered one of the three; the glue, really, that is holding the friendship. She's just trying to find ways to live out her youth – to party, drink and get laid – as herself.

As in real life, reality takes its aim on these three friends and challenges the staying power of their friendship. As not in real life (and sadly why not), it all happens while they sing, sometimes in the most unlikely places and with the most unlikely of people. *SPOILER* (On top of alarming cars or in a bar with Hulk Hogan?) In essence, what Richard Wong and H.P. Mendoza has given us is a remarkable piece of film art. Film art's intention is to reflect back to us, like a mirror, things that we may not be able to see because we're to busy in our lives to see them. Colma represents "nothing and everything" in our past that is comfortable, secure and what made us happy at one point. We all have a Colma in our lives. Whether it is Somerset, NJ or Mikey, or high school memories, we've all been in a state of Colma: a state where we don't know what is anymore, yet we can't let go. And it's only us that can choose whether to stay in Colma or come out of Colma and into the unknown forward...closer towards "our happy place."

Quirky doesn't even begin to describe this one

[preppy-3 · 8/10 · 18 June 2007]

Musical about three friends--Billy (Jake Moreno), Rodel (writer H.P. Mendoza) and Maribel (L.A. Renigen). They live in a small town named Colma, have just graduated from high school and aren't sure what they want to do. Billy wants to be an actor but isn't sure if he can do it. Gay Rodel doesn't know what he wants and can't tell his father that he's gay. Maribel is a friend of the two.

Very odd movie. The music and songs are good (if repetitious) and there's a show stopper in a bar. There was also an excellent use of split (or multiple) screens and it was shot on beautiful locations. But the movie was too long (20 minutes could have been cut); the acting wasn't that good; Moreno is a handsome man...but not the best singer; the characters were basically pretty obnoxious and there doesn't seem to be any point to it all. Also characters act strange for no other reason than to act strange (Billy's manager especially). Still I did enjoy it (mostly) and the songs were good. You might like this. Definitely worth a look if you love musicals.

This movie rocks my socks off

[bostonvoc · 10/10 · 24 April 2006]

I only knew about H.P. Mendoza from his music. I didn't even know what he looked like. This movie blew my mind. If Ghost World were a musical, and They Might Be Giants helped out, you'd have Colma.

It feels like no other musical I've ever seen. It has that alternative edge that a lot of other musicals claim to have. And I don't mean alternative like Nickelback. I mean like that alternative sound that's been alternative since the eighties.

And the characters are so free and trapped at the same time. Every character has some major faults, but you can't help but like them all. Rent wishes it were this realistic.

I swear, if you like They Might Be Giants, Cake, Presidents of the USA, and all of those bands like that, you will absolutely love Colma: The Musical.

I laughed, I cried, I went home happy

[cinelex · 10/10 · 13 May 2006]

This has to be one of the very best musicals I've ever seen, in terms of sheer entertainment value. It's funny, emotional, and ambitiously produced.

The music is a key element. It's intentionally simplistic and, yes, even a tad campy. But it's perfect. I don't even think I would want to hear a fully orchestrated version. The instrumental arrangements, even the occasionally shaky vocal deliveries are spot on. If everything was perfect, it would be a Hollywood musical. But it's not. It's the brilliant indie revelation that is Colma.

Jake Morreno is a genius. He's the new Jim Carrey, but with twice the heart. The whole cast deserves major kudos for their performances. And the director has my utmost respect for even daring to do something like this.

It takes guts to make a movie like this. Too often do filmmakers fall flat on their face in such an ambitious pursuit. But Colma is a joyous, remarkable, and thoroughly enjoyable film.

The best movie ever!

[glennaa11 · 10/10 · 10 May 2006]

"Colma: The Musical" is now my all-time favorite film. It is about 3 friends fresh out of high school who have to figure out what to do next now that the structure of school is gone. The characters all ring true and the music is completely catchy. You will be humming along to the songs and have them stuck in your head for days after you hear them. On top of that the photography is fantastic. For a film made on a shoestring budget it is a huge achievement to have a film that looks this good and is so technically sound. I have seen plenty of low budget films over the years and you can tell that those films had to cut corners, but Colma looks and sounds like a much more expensive production. The performances of the leads are all fantastic. As the other review said the characters all have their flaws which is what makes them so three dimensional and gives the film its realism. See this film if you can, you will love it!

Yay! A suburban musical!

[Spuzzlightyear · 8/10 · 18 October 2006]

'Colma the Musical' is all about a trio of friends, 1 actor, 1 gay would-be poet, and their female friend (fag hag is a good word) and their growing up and becoming distant from the suburb they live in, and from each other. This is a really nice piece, as it sure hits home how friends can be fabulous one day, and the next, you're like, 'eh, get away from me'. The performances in this one were pretty great. The actor type guy was CUTE *ahem, sorry*, and wished the gay poet guy and the actor guy could have traded roles. JUST BECAUSE I WANTED TO HAVE FANTASIES ABOUT HIM. (ahem, sorry (cough) There were some great songs in this one too! I still can remember several, even after the screening I went to, well over a month ago.

My main problem is that the film looked the budget (eg not very much) in many shots.) I guess a lot was saved for the music and choreography first! That's all right I guess, because the movie does have some great ideas about turning the musical on it's head!

what a great movie

[christiannyc2 · 10/10 · 18 July 2007]

well i went not knowing what this movie was about, or even 'what' Colma was! wow was i surprised, this movie was very well done for low budget. the writing witty and funny, also moving at times. The acting great, the music was real good too had me tapping my feet ;o) the musical numbers were well choreographed with some great touches. I think that Mendoza did a great job and i am looking forward to more from him. i loved L.A Renigan! she rocks. Please go and support this movie it really deserves it! I gave this movie 10 out of 10.. not because it was one of the best .. but because so much effort must have gone into the making of it, on such a low budget.