Greenfield's exploration of Imelda Marcos's narrative takes on what The New York Times calls a "dialectic" approach, allowing Imelda to tell her narrative and slowly introducing opposing viewpoints as the movie progresses.[3]
The film is organically divided into two parts, following the chronology of the events of Marcos's life.
The first half focuses on Imelda's life from the time she became first lady of the Philippines in 1965, through the 21 years where she and her husband ruled the Philippines, until they were deposed and forced into exile by the 1986 People Power Revolution.[8][14]
As described by IndieWire, the second half of the film "features survivors of her husband's declaration of martial law and focuses on the political comeback of the Marcos family,"[6] focused on the ascension of her son, Bongbong Marcos, to increasingly prominent national posts.[15]
In numerous promotional interviews, Greenfield characterizes Imelda Marcos as the documentary's unreliable narrator.[2][1][10]
In various interviews, Greenfield says she did not know this was going to be the case. She went into the first interviews with Marcos without knowing what to expect.[2]
In an interview with Vox,[2] Greenfield recounts thinking Imelda was being "surprisingly candid" in her first interview, and that she first thought Marcos actually believed her own words. Greenfield only realized that some of Marcos's statements were "obviously untrue" once she did further research. In later interviews, the topics got to "really egregious things," which Greenfield says made it "really clear" Marcos was lying.
She's a narcissist. I think she does believe her own story, but the self-serving, strategic story, too. I think that in the past, people have made the mistake of thinking she's delusional, and she kind of puts that out there, but I think it's very strategic. She says early on in the film, "People underestimate women, and sometimes that's useful." I think people have underestimated her, and that's made her only the more powerful and successful.
Dialectic approach
Greenfield recounts that Marcos was so effective that test-viewers who watched the interviews could not tell whether or not Marcos was lying.[2] So in order to make sure viewers understood that something Marcos was saying was untrue, Greenfield would intersperse interviews with people who knew otherwise, such as Martial Law torture victims and officials who investigated the Marcoses. This resulted in a narrative style which the New York Times described as "dialectic."[3]
Another method Greenfield used in order to show that Imelda Marcos is an unreliable narrator was to turn the interviews into instances of Cinéma vérité, showing that Marcos was making efforts to project a pre-planned image of herself.[2] One example prominently shown in early trailers shows how Marcos accidentally knocks over a glass picture frame, but doesn't acknowledge the fact even while a uniformed servant cleans the glass shards off the floor for her.[1]
I see that scene as showing how unstoppable she is. ... I think about it more like she breaks things and she's not even aware and lets other people clean up the mess. She doesn't even acknowledge it. She's telling her story about being friends with and courting all of the dictators of the 20th century, so she doesn't pay attention to the wreckage around her and the fact that other people have to deal with it.
The Kingmaker made its Philippine debut on January 29, 2020, when it was shown for the first time at the Cultural Center of the Philippines (CCP).[21] Both Imelda and Bongbong Marcos were invited to the premiere but did not respond to Greenfield's invitation,[22] and two of President Aquino's sisters, Viel Aquino-Dee and Ballsy Aquino-Cruz, attended a later screening at the University of the Philippines Diliman on February 25, 2020.[23] It was later released on iWantTFC, the streaming platform of ABS-CBN, on May 15, 2020,[24] and made available to watch on demand starting August 1 of that year.[25]
On March 19, 2022, the original documentary premiered in the Philippines for free on YouTube with more than 500,000 views as of May 4, ahead of the May 9 elections.[26] The Tagalog dub and Tagalog subtitle version was released on March 30 which is also accessible in the official Evergreen Pictures YouTube channel.[27]
Five separate Tagalog-dubbed versions of the film with subtitled versions in Tagalog, Bisaya, Ilocano, Bicolano, and Hiligaynon premiered on the first week of April 2022 with a preceding announcement by Greenfield via Twitter.[28] They can all be accessed and downloaded for free in Evergreen Pictures' Vimeo[29] and official website of the Digital Museum of Martial Law.[30]
The documentary was also streamed in various local film festivals in the Philippines.[31]
Reception
Critical response
The Kingmaker received critical acclaim and has a 97% Certified Fresh rating from Rotten Tomatoes. The critical consensus on Rotten Tomatoes reads, "The Kingmaker aims a disquieting spotlight at the private life of a divisive public figure – as well as the ways in which unchecked power seduces and corrupts."[32] On Metacritic, the film has a weighted average score of 76 out of 100 based on 16 critics, indicating "generally favorable reviews".[33]
