Hayop Ka!

I set my expectations low, when I saw the mainstream local actors were the voice of the characters. Its premise as typical cheap romantic comedy gives me a bad vibes because of reputation of poorly-made-overused plot lines that plagues Filipino mainstream cinema. But I still give it a chance because Filipino animations are not common. I like the cultural references and the catch of the story. I think making it as adult, dark comedy animation film is a great move. In short "Hayop Ka!" Exceeds my expectations, 7/10.

The Movie is pretty good, the dialogue is very witty, and very Filipino. Some or most of the Jokes I'm not sure Foreigners will appreciate as much, like when Nimfa said, "sa Pares pa talaga nag propose", LOL.

The Characterizations were also pretty good by everybody in the Cast. The Plot is also very Filipino, like Nimfa supporting her Sister's Education, etc. and it is not as predictable as you might think, there are some surprising twists in the Story also.

Stick around for the Credits, the rest of Nimfa's Story is also shown in Story Board format. And I also loved Empoy's rendition (I think it was Empoy) of Jose Mari Chan's "Beautiful Girl" at the end. Overall it is a Must Watch for me.

All that is good in this title is it's eye-catching art. Granted, I watched the English dub, so I could have missed a lot of untranslatable jokes throughout the movie, but it seemed that most of them are toilet humour and jokes for 12-year-olds anyway. The whole plot revolves around such trivial and beaten tropes that nothing in the movie strikes me as exciting or unexpected. This title could have tried to be anything else but the cheesy and unoriginal romcom that it is, and with the beautiful art direction it could be more mature and bring more to the table in terms of story and characters. The main plot doesn't grab any stars from the sky, nor does it even try to be original. My takeaway: I would love to see more projects by the animation team behind this movie, but in a title that will actually make me feel something.

During the first half of "Hayop Ka," tons of cliches from filipino teleseryes and movies were shown, including some funny jokes and references. But after an argument scene that features Robin Padilla's terrific voice acting, the film actually got better. Despite being quite annoying during the first half, the character of Nymfa won me over due to her journey and the ending wherein I realized that a lot of Filipinas end up with the same situation.

Really impressed w/ the visuals and animation. Story could work a bit better tho.