PALASIG (1952)

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PALASIG (1952)

Release Date:  April 15-24, 1952 / Life Theater

Produced by Sampaguita Pictures

Cast:  Cesar Ramirez, Gloria Romero, Aruray, Tony Cayado

Totoy Torrente, Pedro Faustino, Dolores Crescini

Directed by Artemio B. Tecson

Source:  Literary Song-Movie Magazine

              April 1952

              (courtesy of Simon Santos, Video 48)

       A sultan, on a pleasure trip, came to Manila where he meets a pretty girl whom he falls in love.  They become engaged ad they are making preparation for marriage when the Sultan is called by an urgent business to sail abroad.  The girl who is left behind, thinking that he would not come back and fearing that she would be the object of sneers in the social group to which she belongs, marries another before the child she carries in her womb would begin to show.  After a time however, the Sultan comes back, makes discreet inquiries and finds out what happened to his former sweetheart  Believing that the child is really his, he order his aide, Dampilan, to kidnap the child which Dampilan does while the parents are away from home.  The Sultan comes back to his sultanate, but keeps the presence of the child a secret to his people, until one day he decides to let them know about it.  The revelation is not welcome by his people, specially by Datu Balawis, his brother, who is now deprived of his successional right to the Sultanate by virtue of the presence of the child-heir whoo is named Palasig.  Balawis plats to kill Palasig, but the child is ably defended by Dampilan, a loyal follower of the Sultan.  But in one of his attempts to overthrow the Sultan, the latter is killed.  Through the intervention of Dampilan, however, the child assumes the throne of his father.  The mother, in the meantime, thinking that her child was dead, adopts another and names her Florinda.  Palasig all the while grows up into manhood and gives up the idea of seeing again his mother, inasmuch as she has not done anything to rescue him.  He trains himself to be fit to honor his father's throne.  After some years, Florinda and her adopted Father, while on a trip to the south, fall prey to a group of Moro sea raiders.  Florinda falls a captive to Datu Balawis group.  When Palasig meets Florinda, he frees her and this leads to a feud between the two until Balawis is killed.  It is clear that Palasig is in love with Florinda, an when he announces that he would marry her, the Sultan's people repudiate his choice because the bride he has chosen is a Christian.  Led by the council of panditas or Moro priests, even Dampilan, his loyal friend turns against Palasig.  What happens henceforth is anybody's guess.

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