"Bata Bata" By Lynna

The film Bata-Bata is about a woman, Lea, who has 2 young children, Maya and Ojie. Lea is a single mother but lives with her boyfriend, Ding and the two children. Ding is the father of Lea’s youngest child, Maya. Ojie’s father, Raffy, left Lea when she was pregnant with him because of his job. Lea is a very determined woman and independent. She decided not to follow her first husband and to live her life, even though if it meant that she would raise their child by herself. To her, she believes that it wasn’t fair for herself to give up her life or even put things on hold for someone else. So, they separated.
The film depicts the society’s view of women, how it is to be a mother, and how a mother executes this role through modern-day concepts of parenthood. The central character in the film, Lea, played a role of a woman in Filipino society wherein the males were, in the past, assuming more dominant roles in society.
In the beginning of the film, everything in Lea’s life was going smoothly. Her life in connection with her children, with friends of the opposite gender, and with her volunteer work for a human rights organization was going good. But Lea’s children were both growing-up and she could see their gradual transformation. There were the changes in their ways and personalities: Maya’s curiosity was becoming more obvious every day, while Ojie was crossing the boundaries from boyhood to teenage to adulthood. Maya is like a little instigator (troublemaker) because her curiosity leads her to saying things to people that is not appropriate. Her behavior is what tends to lead to arguments between her parents. Ding does not like how Maya gossips about people in front of people and he blames Lea for their daughters behavior. Ojie rebels because of his situation. His father comes back into his life and wants to take full custody of him. He seems confused when his mother tells him that his choice is up to him. At one part of the film, Ojie and Lea gets into an argument because she catches him at a bar. Lea’s relationship with her ex-husband and her boyfriend goes down hill. At the end, she loses both of them. Lea experienced the fear of losing both her children, when the fathers of her children decide to take them away from her embrace. In the end, both of Lea’s children decided to choose to stay with her – a decision that Lea never forced upon them.
I really enjoyed watching this film. I like Lea’s role because she portrays many women today. That is, she is very independent and a strong minded woman. I like how she puts herself out, not fearing what others might say or think of her. For example, I laughed at the scene where she goes on a business trip with one of the nuns and how she talks to her about sex. At first, Lea thought she was going on this trip with her male co-worker but it turned out that he didn’t end up going and she is stuck with a nun. She dresses up and even pampered herself for this trip. Her thinking is that there was nothing wrong with human sexuality and so she freely talks to the nun about sex. She even recommended that she tries it too. That was weird. When she was on this trip, her 2 children got into an accident. They got hurt from riding the new bike they got from their mother. Lea ends up rushing to the hospital. When she gets there, she sees her ex and her boyfriend. They were both mad at her because she didn’t let either one of them know that she was leaving on this business trip. The worse part was that she left her 2 children with her ex-husband’s wife who is pregnant. I’m not sure if her pregnancy was induced because of the children being left with her. Raffy is really upset with Lea. Ding was upset with her because she didn’t let him know anything. He told her that she was irresponsible. They got into an argument at the hospital and that was when he told her he was leaving her. While all of these were happening to her, Lea also was struggling to maintain her hectic job at the women’s crisis center. She works for an NGO for women under domestic violence.
Overall, I would have to say that this was a great film. It was very realistic and I really like how it regards to women’s right. I like how the film focused so much on the woman and who she really is. It was something different from the typical Filipino woman we know of because of how the country is a patriarchal society. An outsider does not know of the small number of Filipino woman today who are very independent. Lea’s character portrayed a brave and modern woman and at the same time, fragile. I like her character because she was this strong Filipino woman who is trying her best to be a good mother to her children and also career-minded at the same time. I would recommend this film to others because it goes to show that in today’s society, we have strong minded women out there. We are no longer subordinates of our husbands and that we have the same rights and privileges as men do. I also like Maya’s character in this film. Even though she was this little gossip, she was this little innocent child who served a mirror of her mother’s personality. She was funny.