Tragic Theater is based on a book that claims that the theater of Manila Film Center is haunted by the spirits of the victim who were buried beneath the building during an accident while it was being built in 1981. Honestly, I am not familiar with the book, but the movie suffers with an unfocused narrative, that mostly doesn't involve much of the theater and more concerned to its characters. It becomes even less compelling when we do not have much time to care for them. Apart from that side, the movie still offers some impressively staged scares that can be worth paying attention, which is a shame because those well directed scenes aren't given a better story.
The best part of the movie is the opening scene. It doesn't really need much of an explanation, the sequence already provides enough dramatic tension to the incident, which could have been just a scene of destruction. The black-and-white treatment made it even more effective. The history alone brings so much potential as a horror film. But in spite that it's about the exorcism of the titular theater, the film's story is more focused on the main characters whose backstories have nothing to do with the haunted theater. It spends a lot of time with flashbacks of their personal tragedy, attempting to let the audience care for them. But it just doesn't work and rather slows down its more interesting exorcism. Another reason why those scenes exist probably to set up a twist in the end, but the twist eventually doesn't justify anything whatsoever. The movie just wastes time by these random sad stories when we would rather seek more of the actual threat.
Even the characters fail to be reasonable, most of them make some nonsensical decisions, example is when Annie puts herself and the other spirit communicators in danger so she could answer her cellphone call. Another part is when one of the exorcists has gone missing and none of them mentions about him or wonders about his whereabouts ever again until they wanted to. Those, at least, are the worst examples which robs the suspense of losing any of those characters. None of the actors tried to go beyond their usual performance.
The best effort here is coming from director Tikoy Aguiluz. His filmmaking skill is the only one that speaks the true horror of the film, aside of the score. Though, the film still uses silly CGI and jump scares, it often uses practical effects scares, which involves dust, shadows, and creepy animals. And that delivers a lot compellingly than what we usually see in horror today. There are also some well shot scenes that keeps the movie looking good. The music score is tremendous, giving a strong atmosphere throughout the experience, which made the overall movie kind of feel like an iconic relic.
It's kind of unfair to call Tragic Theater a bad film regarding to how admirable the effort of the director and the filmmakers were towards the project. This is basically a solid film stuck in a messy, incoherent narrative. The worst parts can't be easily ignored, but we don't often see a local horror film that tries to do something different in this era of the genre. But the biggest letdown of the film is how less it is about the ghosts or at least the history of the Manila Film Center and anything that is involved with it. It could have made for an intriguing social commentary to what caused that mistake or an actual tragedy to the victims who are stuck in such grave. Or basically a less vague main villain within their situation. But instead, we spend more time with the lives of these characters. It's more of a waste of opportunity than a failure, at least they tried. But really those creepy moments still deserve a way better story to tell.
