Arjo Atayde and Jessy Mendiola for STRANDED

“When you’re afraid, take deep breaths and you’ll be okay.” -Arjo

Watched STRANDED this evening. This film stars Jessie Mendiola and Arjo Atayde and throng of support stars from Regal Films. Honestly, the movie had us wondering about the plot at face value because of the title. It made sense when they started telling us the personas of their character. Jessie plays a corporate slave, goody two shows woman who wants stability, but lost her sense of adventure and life. Arjo on the other hand is in between jobs, albeit successful, he turns into a food delivery connoisseur and crossed paths with geeky Jessie one day.

Stranded becomes a reality when the heavens would have a hand on it. Ice Adanan doesn’t hurry telling things, it felt like a normal romance between the two was brewing, but they have their priorities and relationships to deal with before this thing happened. They will be stranded in their own situations, but both characters give you a sense that they haven’t really given up on their dreams, they still gave it a try in the end.

This romance never had much drama, it didn’t really have much complications other than their own lives. Nobody cried much in the movie, everything was made subtle, because if it didn’t need to be told like that, they didn’t have to resort to TV Patrol acting. Nothing annoying of that nature, it was just one was being cute, the other had qualms to reciprocate his innuendos.

I think this is much of a feel good movie rather than a drama piece. Arjo and Jessie are natural actors, they didn’t have to be over the top in any scene and that might be good for people who don’t want stress. I think it wants to inspire you to do things that you want to do, to tick off everything on your bucketlist and not feel bad about it. Because ultimately, you can find your happiness, and not just depend on others to find it.

Because it may not be enough. Worthy to watch? Yeah, definitely. Regal thinks you should just watch it for merits of making you feel good about your decisions, that’s what the movie implies to me.

STRANDED will show on theaters April 10, in cinemas nationwide!