The audience refused to enter the movie theater until the star had arrived. They hung around the tiny lobby --- grandmothers and gay men, working women in their office uniforms --- elbow to elbow in front of the popcorn and refreshments stand, eyes peeled for a small "morena" woman in her 40s with a mole on her left cheek and eyes that seem to swallow you.

The guards enjoined the people to take their seats, the screening would begin shortly. They were pointedly ignored.

Inside the theater vintage Nora Aunor wafted from the speakers -- -'70s pop songs whose cheesy lyrics and maudlin melodies sounded incongruous sung in "that voice". In that voice, asinine rhymes about lovers and moonlight become something like poetry, and jukebox emotions are transformed into genuine anguish. "Someone once wrote that he was worried about Nora's singing," Gerard remarked. "Her voice didn't seem to leave space for her to breathe."

At 8 o'clock or so a tiny figure in white suit materialized in the theater, and the audience erupted in cheers. Someone chanted "No- ra! No-ra!" The chant was taken up in the balcony seats and in seconds, the movie became a political rally.

"It's so '70s!" Danton cried. "I feel like I'm in Life Theater with my lola in 1970!"

"I feel like an embryo," I said.

Danton whipped out a magazine with Nora Aunor on the cover and started clamoring for her autograph. "Ate Guy!" he shrieked. Gerard took the magazine and passed it to someone who handed it to Nora. The magazine returned inscribed to Danton. Now that's clout.

What is it about Nora Aunor that has spawned mass hysteria for nearly three decades? What is it about Nora and her multitudes? It is as if she feeds on the adulation of the crowd, absorbs their devotion until she seems to grow in size and radiance, blotting out the people standing around her. Then she reflects this radiance back to the crowd. "That" is stardom.

After a series of stupid trailers which pretty much summed up the state of our local movies, the screening of "Bakit May Kahapon Pa?" commenced. The title is not worthy of this fine movie --- it calls to mind a "komiks" melodrama. Gerard said the director would've preferred the title "Lagablab", which means blaze; a fiery title would've suited this tale of a woman consumed and twisted by her lust for revenge. Portraying a woman driven mad by the murder of her parents and obsessed with destroying the military officer (Eddie garcia) who ordered their deaths, Nora lets us see why her character has come to this extreme. In the role of a remorseful killer, she is oddly sympathetic.

Eddie Garcia is masterful as the general who maintains that he did what he had to do for the country. Dawn Zulueta as the general's daughter is the only character who undergoes a change as the movie progresses, and she delivers a graceful, intelligent performance. Seen in flashbacks as the young Nora Aunor, Sarah Jane Abad bridges the gap between the character's trauma and her eventual madness.

I wish I could say more about the screenplay, but the most powerful scenes were drowned out by audience applause. Adding to the '70s ambience of the premiere was the distinctive smell of burning organic substances. Then again, I had not come to see the premiere of a Nora Aunor movie; I had come to experience the Nora phenomenon first-hand.

In the next few days you will read much about how the Film Ratings Board did not find "Bakit May Kahapon Pa?" worthy of a B- rating. I am not aware of the standards by which the FRB reviews movies, but I have seen some of the movies it has rated B, and they were inferior to this one. According to Danton, the reviewers from FRB had noted that Nora's character never rose above her psychosis. In the first place, it is not for the FRB to decide what happens to the character --- they did not make this movie. In the second hand, many loonies stay loony.

The movie nede to wild applause, and Nora Aunor rose from her seat to acknowledge her multitudes. "It's like the ending of "Himala!" Danton cried as the diminutive form in the white suit was borne away in a sea of adoring fans.