User reviews

i really didn't plan on watching any movies this week. but, i'm glad my friend and i decided to watch ako legal wife. it's super funny. the surprise was zsa zsa padilla who was hilarious! she was great in her character. technically, it really wasn't that amazing. and once again, the script wasn't as intelligent as could be. but, that's pinoy comedy for you. and since i'm pinoy, i loved it. it mocked some filipino Chinese traditions. so, if you're a sensitive filipino Chinese, don't watch this movie. it was quite an exaggeration of colors and other things, but it made it all the more funny in an ironic way. the character of john pratts was my favorite. he reminded me so much of a good friend in school who has the exact same like story.

1st watched 2/13/2010 - 4 out of 10 (Dir-Joel C. Lamangan): An OK comedy about a man and his three and possibly more wives coming from the perspective of the three main ones. This is kind of a "I Love Lucy"-type comedy with the main wife, played by Rufa Mae Quinto, kind of resembling Lucille Ball in her mannerism's when things happen to her. It was funny for the first 45 minutes, but then when the #1(legal)wife started trying to better the others and the gay son was introduced as an important character -- the movie kind of went downhill. The gay character was played very over-the-top and the attempts at humor using him were very lame(at least from a more accepting American viewpoint). Rufa Mae Quinto won an award for this role in the Phillipines and I have to admit she does a good job of bringing out the humor from her character, but the jokes become stale after awhile which happens with many comedies. A comedy that sustains it's humor for a good one hour and a half or so(which is usually a movie length)is rare and this is not one of them. There is also a very bad ending(which I won't go into right now so I don't spoil the movie for those who want to view it)but it put me in a position where I wasn't sure if I wanted to even praise the first 45 minutes -- that's how bad it turned me off. The material is good for a half-hour comedy show -- with the right actors -- but this shouldn't have ventured past that. I stopped wanting to pay attention long after it stopped being funny, and that is the final deciding factor for my reviews on movies, usually.

I can't believe the raves some people are saying about AKO LEGAL WIFE. Or maybe there is another film with the same title that i am not aware of. AKO LEGAL WIFE is the worst Filipino film i have ever watched in my entire life! It has no story! It has the most overwhelming showcase of overacted performances! It is filled with humor that has been done ten billion times! It is a 2-hour display of nothing but offensive stereotypes. It's unfunny and mind-insulting from beginning to end. I have exactly no idea on which part of the film some people had a good laugh. Was it Cherry Pie Picache's Visayan accent? The Filipino-Chinese's excessive belief and reliance on feng shui? Ruffa Mae Quinto's "palengkera" and loud attitude? John Prat's flamboyant but closeted character? Or ZsaZsa Padilla's acts of desperation including a bad boob job?! There is nothing hilarious in this film.

Once again, Mother Lily and Joel Lamangan prove that they are the worst tandem in Philippine cinema. I certainly wish that Mother Lily fulfills her threat not to join the next Metro Manila Film Festivals because, finally, the film fest will be spared from the pieces of crap she produces year after year. Good riddance!

I know next to nothing about Filipino cinema but I hope to God 'Ako Legal Wife' is an exception rather than an example.

Ten minutes into the movie, my sister, who was also watching with me, stopped paying attention. I stuck it out hoping that the best was yet to come. Sadly, I was highly disappointed for the next two or so hours.

The storyline is not only hard to follow but completely shallow. When did Elton get married to his other wives? Why the heck were Zsa Zsa Padilla and Cherry Pie Picache's characters so intent on staying with their unfaithful husband, who, despite the film's attempt to make it appear towards the end to point out that he actually did love his wives, didn't appear to give a damn about them at all. Not only is the story shallow, so are the characters.

The two things that kept this movie from getting a rating of one from me was the part where Patty and Chona come face to face at the dinner party (definitely a classic diva moment) and the part where Patty tries to keep her son from leaving and accidentally rips off his shirt to reveal his tattoo. It's so far-fetched it's funny. And well, Picache is good enough to deliver a great performance of a mother going hysterical over her baby 'mutilating' his skin with permanent ink.

Everything else is just not funny. John Prats' Hamilton is so stereotypically gay that there's nothing novel or entertaining about the character or Prats' performances. Trixia & Nixon? Do we care? And after over two hours of trying to find the point of this movie, I can't really say I care to know now.

Five years, two drama sequels and one comedy sequel later, nothing has changed on the status of the overrated Mano Po franchise; the story is still simple but expounded upon too much, the acting deliveries were still futile, and the producers again (and again) raised expectation all too high for the audiences only to find a humdrum of a movie.

The story of 'Ako Legal Wife' is centered on the story of Zsa Zsa Padilla's character named Chona Chong, the 'martyr' wife of serial womanizer Elton Chong (played by Jay Manalo) and her exploits to grab the attention of her husband from his mistresses, played by Cherrie Pie Picache and Rufa Mae Quinto. The other cast of characters were played by Pinky Amador, Bianca King, Julianne Lee, John Prats, Ella Guevarra, among others.

With the exception of John Prats' so-so performance as a closet homosexual, the rest of the cast of 'Ako Legal Wife' delivered a non-comedic, partly pitiful performances as their respective characters. The talents of promising dramatic actors Jay Manalo and Cherrie Pie Picache are wasted on ultra-clichéd dialogues and sequences already overdone by Bubble Gang. The Mano Po series is also notorious for casting big-named actors in five-second scenes, and Pinky Amdaor is the victim this time around, after Angel Locsin and others in the previous movies. The same could probably be said of child drama star Ella Guevarra, whose character could've been played by any other child actor in the industry today.

The movie is a complete waste of the actors talents, the producer's money, and the audiences' precious time. A lot of things had gone wrong in the movie, and not one element could save another; the storyline was too dull and the acting too ordinary.

I never thought I would say it, but I think we've had enough of Chinoys on the silver screen after five years.

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