A Tale of Two Fangs
Ah, Aswang (2011) — a film that proves that not every myth should be adapted for the screen, especially when the script reads like a rejected Twilight fanfiction set in rural Batangas. Directed and co-written by Jerrold Tarog, this remake of Peque Gallaga’s 1992 cult horror classic tries to blend Filipino folklore, social commentary, and monster romance into a single cinematic lump. Unfortunately, what we get is a movie that’s equal parts melodrama, monster mash, and migraine.
Now, don’t get me wrong — the original Aswang from the ’90s had bite, atmosphere, and some legitimate horror craftsmanship. It had grit. It had mystery. It had the kind of eerie sensuality that made you think twice before walking home alone. The 2011 version, on the other hand, has… CGI ravens, an awkward love story, and the cinematographic equivalent of a dim flashlight in a blackout.
The Plot: Underground Birds and Overground Nonsense
The story begins promisingly enough — or at least it pretends to. Two kids, Gabriel and Ahnia, are on the run from hitmen after their family is murdered. Naturally, they stumble into the one Filipino town that makes Silent Hill look like a gated community. This town, we’re told, is being terrorized by the Abuwaks — shapeshifting monsters that burrow underground and pop up to murder people like homicidal prairie dogs.
Enter Hasmin (Lovi Poe), a mysterious woman who saves the kids from the creatures and brings them to her blind foster mother, Guada. Hasmin seems like your classic gothic heroine — beautiful, brooding, and allergic to daylight. Of course, she’s also secretly the Bangkilan — a queen Aswang who can turn people into monsters. You know, the kind of revelation that makes for great dinner conversation.
Things escalate when the hired killers arrive in town, led by Gido, Queenie, and Daniel. Daniel, who has the charisma of a damp rice cracker, becomes the film’s “hero.” He’s supposed to be conflicted — a hitman with a heart of gold — but mostly he just looks confused about why he’s there.
The film takes its sweet time meandering through love triangles, raven attacks, and moral debates about the nature of evil. There’s even a subplot about the corrupt mayor making deals with the monsters, because nothing says horror like graft and bureaucracy. Eventually, the story devolves into a CGI bird-fight finale where everyone either dies, transforms, or stares dramatically into the moonlight like they’re auditioning for an emo band.
The Acting: As Wooden as a Vampire’s Stake
Let’s start with the obvious: Lovi Poe is the film’s only saving grace. She does her best to inject some soul into Hasmin, managing to look both ethereal and exhausted — which, given the script, feels like method acting. She moves through the film with the weary dignity of an actress who knows she deserves better material.
Paulo Avelino, as Daniel, is handsome, yes — but about as expressive as a granite countertop. He spends most of the film either grimacing or whispering things like “I’m not ready to die” with all the passion of someone ordering takeout. His chemistry with Lovi Poe has all the heat of a broken rice cooker.
The rest of the cast is a blur of local TV faces doing their best with dialogue that sounds like it was translated through Google twice. Marc Abaya chews scenery as the unhinged hitman Gido, and Niña Jose’s Queenie has that telenovela-level commitment to overacting that makes you wish someone would hand her a cape and let her monologue in front of a thunderstorm.
And then there’s little Jillian Ward as Ahnia, the perpetually wide-eyed child who looks like she wandered in from a Wansapanataym episode and accidentally ended up in a bloodbath.
The Direction: A Monster Movie That’s Afraid of Monsters
Jerrold Tarog is a talented director (Heneral Luna later proved that), but here, it feels like he was directing two different movies at once — a horror film and a drama about family trauma — and accidentally spliced them together in the dark.
The pacing is glacial. Scenes stretch on forever, filled with long stares, whispered dialogue, and slow zooms that seem allergic to excitement. The monsters themselves — the Abuwaks — should be terrifying, but they’re mostly an inconsistent mix of shaky CGI and flapping shadows. Imagine if The Birds was remade using early PlayStation cutscene graphics.
And when the Abuwaks go underground? Oh boy. The “burrowing” effect looks like someone dropped a shadow filter into Adobe After Effects and called it a day.
Even the action scenes, which should inject some adrenaline, play out like tired rehearsal footage. Guns go off, monsters screech, and nobody seems particularly motivated to live. It’s as if everyone read the script and decided death might be the better option.
The Horror: Now You See It, Now You Snore
For a movie about flesh-eating, shape-shifting monsters, Aswang is shockingly short on actual horror. Most of the film’s scares involve loud noises, quick cuts, or people screaming at things off-screen. When the camera does show us something, it’s usually a CGI creature so badly rendered it makes you nostalgic for practical effects — or for closing your eyes.
There’s blood, sure, but it feels sterile, like someone spilled spaghetti sauce on a white shirt. The gore never feels tactile, the terror never feels earned, and the supposed “creepy atmosphere” mostly feels like someone forgot to pay the electric bill.
It’s not even unintentionally funny, which would’ve been something. It’s just bland — the cinematic equivalent of cold lugaw.
The Script: Where Logic Goes to Die
Let’s take a moment to appreciate the script, which somehow manages to make ancient folklore sound like a bad group chat. Every revelation is spoon-fed through clunky exposition, and characters have a habit of explaining things the audience already knows.
“Hasmin, you’re an Abuwak!”
“Yes, I am an Abuwak. The kind that turns people into Abuwaks.”
Great. Thanks for clearing that up.
The dialogue swings wildly between solemn mythic gravitas (“Our kind has lived in the shadows for centuries”) and bizarre domestic chatter (“Did you eat the last of the adobo?”). And the moral lessons — something about love conquering evil or being true to your nature — get buried under melodrama and bird noises.
Production Design: Gothic or Just Grimy?
Visually, Aswang tries hard. Too hard. The film’s palette is all moody greens and browns, like a swamp-themed Instagram filter. Every location looks perpetually damp. The plantation where the Abuwaks live is supposed to feel hauntingly mysterious, but mostly it looks like a poorly lit poultry farm.
The costume design isn’t much better — everyone dresses like they’re attending a rustic funeral. Even the monsters, when half-transformed, look like extras from a high school production of Black Swan.
The Ending: Everyone Dies, and So Does Interest
By the time the finale rolls around, you’ve stopped caring who lives, dies, or sprouts feathers. The film builds up to a climactic showdown between Hasmin, Daniel, and the evil Moises, but the payoff is pure chaos — shrieking, explosions, feathers, and all the emotional depth of a chicken adobo commercial.
Daniel becomes an Abuwak, Hasmin rejects her nature, and somewhere in the middle, a grenade explodes. It’s less “thrilling conclusion” and more “PowerPoint presentation titled How Not to End a Movie.”
Final Thoughts: The Myth, the Mess, the Missed Opportunity
Aswang (2011) could’ve been something special — a gritty modernization of a uniquely Filipino monster myth, wrapped in social commentary about corruption and survival. Instead, it’s a feathered fiasco: overstuffed, undercooked, and somehow both too serious and too silly.
Lovi Poe shines, but everyone else drowns in a script that mistakes brooding silence for depth and confusion for suspense. The monsters aren’t scary, the action isn’t thrilling, and the romance is flatter than the special effects budget.
If you want a good Aswang story, go read folklore. If you want a laugh, watch this with friends and play a drinking game for every time someone says “Abuwak.” Just make sure you have plenty of alcohol.
Final Grade: D– (for “Did anyone proofread this?”)
The myth lives on… but hopefully, this version doesn’t.
Tagline: “They hunger for flesh. You hunger for the end credits.”
