Iluminace 2025, 37(3):147-170 | DOI: 10.58193/ilu.1827

Kidlat Tahimik: Metaphorical Journeys in Decolonial Cinema

Ludo de Roo ORCID...
Macquarie University, Australia ✉

Philippine filmmaker Kidlat Tahimik’s debut film Perfumed Nightmare (1979) reveals a sophisticated use of what I term “concrete metaphor:” while evoking complex layers of decolonial critique, his 16mm cinematography keeps the metaphorical abstractions firmly grounded in material reality — a stone bridge, tropical foliage, and rustic sounds of nature. This essay considers the complex role of concrete metaphors in Tahimik’s evolving style. I start by showing how, on the one hand, multimodal extensions of cognitive metaphor theory (CMT) illuminate the dynamic structure of Tahimik’s cinematic metaphors. On the other hand, due to CMT’s intrinsic emphasis on universal cognitive structures, I consider its limitation in accounting for geographic specificity — a key factor anchoring Tahimik’s cultural critique. Through close analysis of the bridge sequences in Perfumed Nightmare, and later a central scene in Balikbayan #1 Redux VI (2016), I retrace how Tahimik’s aesthetic practice displays a subtle transition in his position in decolonial discourse. His earlier work aims at subverting Orientalist binaries from a universal position, where his concrete metaphors — materially amplified in 16mm cinematography — anchor his critique in its region. Instead, his later work increasingly speaks from the Philippines’ Cordillera region; by interweaving celluloid and digital film formats, Tahimik creates essayistic mixtures that are ontologically confounding — here, the material presence of his concrete metaphors generates continuity for his conceptual critique.

Keywords: cinematic metaphor, conceptual metaphor theory, decolonial film theory, film geography, Kidlat Tahimik

Received: June 24, 2025; Revised: November 20, 2025; Accepted: December 18, 2025; Published: February 3, 2026  Show citation

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de Roo, L. (2025). Kidlat Tahimik: Metaphorical Journeys in Decolonial Cinema. Iluminace, 37(3), 147-170. doi: 10.58193/ilu.1827
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