Iginuhit ng Tadhana: A Deep Dive into the First Marcos Propaganda Film
‘Iginuhit ng Tadhana’: A Deep Dive into the First Marcos Propaganda Film
Luis Gonzales and Gloria Romero as Ferdinand and Imelda Marcos in Iginuhit ng Tadhana. Photo courtesy of ABS-CBN.
The Marcos myth-making media machine is back in the mainstream. As of this writing, the Imee Marcos-produced Maid in Malacañang stands as the third highest grossing Filipino film of all time, though it’s unclear how much of its box office numbers were amplified by ticket buying from the government. Regardless of the specific statistics on its success, however, it remains true that it filled the screens of theaters for months both locally and abroad, with its ubiquitous posters in malls alone enough to fulfill its normalization. But this isn’t the first time the Marcos family used cinema to shape the way they’re perceived by the public in order to capture political power. For that we’d have to go back to 1965.
Leading up to the Philippine presidential elections in 1965, then-Senate President Ferdinand E. Marcos commissioned a film about his life in order to aid his upcoming campaign against incumbent president Diosdado Macapagal. The film was called Iginuhit ng Tadhana (“Drawn By Fate”) and it was set to be released a few weeks before the elections under Sampaguita Pictures. It starred three of their most famous actors at the time, Luis Gonzales as Ferdinand, Rosa Mia as his mother Josefa, and Gloria Romero as his wife Imelda. In cameo roles as children, future superstar Vilma Santos plays Ferdinand’s daughter Imee, while his real life son Bongbong plays himself. The film was written by Emmanuel H. Borlaza and Luciano B. Carlos, and directed by Conrado Conde, Jose De Villa, and Mar S. Torres, with each filmmaker handling a third of the story. The first third focuses on Ferdinand’s life from birth up to his infamous defense of himself in the Julio Nalundasan murder trial. The following section shows his experiences as a soldier in World War II. The last is about his decision to marry Imelda and fully pursue a career in politics.
Iginuhit ng Tadhana movie poster. Photo courtesy of Video 48.
Over half a century later, Iginuhit ng Tadhana still persists as the most essential document of the popular myth-making of Ferdinand E. Marcos. It’s particularly notable how much of the film’s characterizations of him and his family were conceived before he even ascended to the highest office. This popular narrative persisted through his tumultuous two decades in power and finally returned with a vengeance full circle with the rise of his son to the presidency in 2022. To cement its legacy further, soon after the elections the entire film was uploaded by the government-funded Philippine News Agency to their YouTube channel with the new addition of full Filipino subtitles.
The film was partially based on Hartzell Spence’s hagiographic biography about Marcos published in 1964, For Every Tear a Victory. The book is responsible for a lot of the most bombastic claims about Marcos’s supposedly heroic war exploits that led to him to be described not only as a war hero, but one of the most decorated soldiers of the Second World War. For a brief taste of this rhetoric here’s an excerpt from the book:
Before he was twenty-five he had won more medals for bravery than anyone else in Philippine history, had suffered the heroic Battle of Bataan and its aftermath, the infamous Death March, and the medieval tortures of the Japanese secret police.
The uncritical acceptance of its contents at the time can also be seen from its international reception. For example, here’s an excerpt of the opening sentences of a writeup by major American book review magazine Kirkus Reviews:
Original Printing of For Every Tear a Victory by Hartzell Spence. Photo Courtesy of Facebook.
It’s tempting to retrospectively look back on these descriptions with confusion or to be aghast at how easily people seem to have taken these as fact, but it’s also necessary to remember the limitations of what could be proven by the public at the time. Since many local media outlets (perhaps such as those owned by the Lopez family, the oligarchical clan that Marcos’ Vice Presidential running mate hailed from), international publications, and even public officials from the United States were not dispelling the claims presented in these works, it makes sense why these were taken for granted as true by many people at the time. And although most may not have read Spence’s book, its narratives took over the mainstream after the release of its film adaptation.
The film opens up with a flash of lightning tearing down a tree as the title credits come on, followed by the gallop of a horse through rumbling rain, eerily setting up the backdrop of the night that birthed Ferdinand as if about to witness the mysterious birth of Christ himself. Miraculously, just as he’s born the storm subsides and brings about bright day. The rest of the film’s tone follows suit. We learn more about Ferdinand as he grows up to be an exemplary budding lawyer whose studies get interrupted by the accusation that he murdered his father’s political rival. It’s described as obviously unfounded as Ferdinand “doesn’t know how to lie” ("hindi marunong magsinungaling”), and he indignantly proclaims that eventually “truth will prevail” (“magtatagumpay ang katotohanan”). The whole sequence surrounding the trial laboriously lasts for over half an hour before he is acquitted by Supreme Court Judge and future Philippine President Jose P. Laurel. Marcos is depicted as a victim of unfair accusations, but due to his genius and genuine trust in the judicial system he is vindicated.
A lot of speculation over the years has surrounded the murder of Julio Nalundasan, with some specialists on Marcos’s life suggesting that it’s likely he was in fact responsible for it. There is also speculation that Laurel acquitted him because he developed sympathy for Ferdinand, who reminded him of his own youth, in terms of their similar academic talent and career paths, as well as their shared experience of being accused of murder at a young age. Regardless of the historical realities of the situation, this first hour of the film is not well paced and is a slog to get through, though Gonzales does his best in the court scenes with the material he was given.
Luis Gonzales and Rosa Mia as Ferdinand and Josefa Marcos in Iginuhit ng Tadhana. Photo Courtesy of ABS-CBN.
The second and shortest third of the film, directed by Jose de Villa, follows his military interlude during World War II. The central mythic element that guides this part of the narrative is Ferdinand’s valiant heroism in fighting the Japanese forces as a response to their killing of his father Mariano. It’s filled with emotional scenes of him and his mother as she attempts to prevent him from fighting in the war, though his patriotism overwhelms her wishes. He returns a hero. This aspect of Ferdinand’s life is further elaborated on four years later when he commissioned the full-scale war film Maharlika for his re-election campaign. It was to star the controversial Dovie Beams, but was indefinitely shelved from release after Imelda found out about their leaked audio sex tape scandal.
Much has already been written about the falsification of many of Marcos’s war records. But the deeper historical myth that underpins this section is that by most accounts his father Mariano did not die by the hands of the Japanese. There is documentation that suggests he was actually a collaborator for them, and according to some sources, was executed by anti-Japanese forces because this was exposed. The history of Filipinos working with the Japanese during this time continues to be a contentious topic to this day. Despite its infrequent engagement in modern discourse, many other politicians were publicly accused of this at the time such as later presidents Jose P. Laurel and Manuel Roxas, the latter of whom spearheaded the pardoning of many fellow supposed collaborators during his presidency.
The final section of the film spans the last hour and mostly focuses on his relentless pursuit of Imelda Romualdez, the cousin of one of his contemporaries in Congress. As is commonly retold, Ferdinand falls for her at first sight and refuses to let up even as she repeatedly refuses his advances. After several days of persistent badgering she finally gives into his proposals for marriage. This pivotal moment is depicted in the film accompanied by the swelling instrumentation of their campaign theme song “Dahil Sa’Yo”. They marry and have children, with their actual son Bongbong playing himself in a scene where he gives an imaginary campaign speech for his siblings, to Imelda’s dismay. In this version of the Marcos story, at least, Imelda doesn’t want her son to follow his father’s footsteps. In terms of his own political career, Ferdinand is depicted as reticent and not entirely certain about the decision to become a politician full-time. The sitting president himself is the one who ends up convincing him to run for office, which leaves him with a final heroic trait: that of the reluctant leader.
Bongbong Marcos as himself in Iginuhit ng Tadhana. Photo Courtesy of YouTube.
This is the most stylistically displaced of the three sections as it transitions from the slow and methodical courtroom drama of the first, to the heaviness of tragic war in the second, and finally to the lightheartedness of a cloying romantic comedy in this last one. Only the committed performances of Luis Gonzales and Gloria Romero save this third from being completely insufferable. But before the film ends it manages to land one final self-important declaration as Imelda is attempting to calm down Ferdinand’s anxiety about pursuing the highest office:
They say that if a person’s desires are clean and honest they usually come true. And if that’s what fate has destined for your life, it’s inevitable.
(“Alam mo kapag malinis daw at tapat ang hangarin ng isang tao kadalasan ‘yan ang nangyayari. at kung sadyang ‘yan ay iginuhit ng tadhana sa iyong buhay, ‘yan ang mangyayari.”)
With these lines Ferdinand E. Marcos’s political future is now up to destiny itself. Any of his eventual successes will therefore be proof of the hand of Fate, of his being exceptionally blessed and chosen by God. The differently translated English title used for the film’s international distribution is particularly telling: Man of Destiny.
It’s unclear to me how much of the currently available film is the same as that which was released in August of 1965. This is because the version of the movie I saw ends with newsreels of Marcos’s victory over Macapagal in November of that year. The current copy must therefore be a re-edited one, though it’s unclear when it was done so, or if there were any other additional changes to the film apart from its ending. It’s known that it was re-released in 1966 for the inaugural Manila Film Festival, as well as being featured in the 13th Asian Film Festival in Seoul, South Korea, so this was perhaps the version shown then.
The Manila Times’ September 3, 1965 Front Page. Photo Courtesy of Video 48.
Overall the film was a resounding success, not due to its artistic qualities or box office performance, but because it powerfully propelled the mythology of Marcos the genius, the patriot, and the statesman, and converted this constructed image into real and tangible political power, regardless of the film’s truth value. Ironically, one of the driving factors for its success was the response of the opposing Macapagal administration. Through the Board of Censors for Motion Pictures, the film was suspended from release, supposedly because they did not receive a screening copy of the film beforehand. However, newspapers around the country reported suspicion that it was a political ploy by Macapagal himself in order to secure his re-election. Following the controversy, the Chairman of the Board of Censors Jose L. Guevarra resigned and the film was eventually allowed to resume its theatrical run. As with most attempts to stop people from watching something, the blatant censorship of the film drove massive interest towards it from a public who may have otherwise not gone out of their way to see it. And in two months Ferdinand E. Marcos would succeed in a close contest his former Liberal Party-mate Diosdado Macapagal to become the country’s 10th president.
The enduring legacy of this film and the book that inspired it is undeniable, cementing a mythology for Marcos not just locally but around the world. The film also spawned a sequel in 1969 with the same primary cast, directed by the highly skilled Eddie Garcia called Pinagbuklod ng Langit, though it seems to be lost. It would take nearly two decades before many of the narratives here were brazenly challenged with hard evidence, and another three for most people to forget those arguments and dismiss them again as gossip. With the release of Maid in Malacañang in 2022 and the ongoing production of the administration-supported Ninoy Aquino biopic Martyr or Murderer, it is clear that the Marcos myth-making media machine is back in action. And so it’s essential to rediscover the roots of the family’s tradition of using the art of cinema to change the way they are perceived by the Filipino people, especially since all past precedence points towards this myth-making to continue through the rest of the new Marcos presidency.
WORKS CITED
Spence, Hartzell. For Every Tear a Victory; the Story of Ferdinand E. Marcos. McGraw-Hill, 1964.
Hamilton-Paterson, James. America's Boy: A Century of Colonialism in the Philippines. H. Holt, 1999.
Mijares, Primitivo. The Conjugal Dictatorship of Ferdinand and Imelda Marcos. Union Square Publications, 1976.
Lapham, Robert. Lapham’s Raiders: Guerillas in the Philippines 1942-1945. University Press of Kentucky, 2014.
Yambot, Isagani. “Movie On Marcos Suspended.” The Manila Times, 3 Sept. 1965.
