Living in the shadow of Mt. Pinatubo in the early 1990s, there is only one thing on the mind of Paolo (Noel Comia Jr.) and his friend Kachi (John Vincent Servilla); the new Nintendo game, The Legend of Zelda.  Unfortunately, due to blackouts from earthquakes and the soon-to-erupt volcano, the boys are unable to play the game and instead must make their own adventure outside.  They meet up with brother and sister pair Gilligan (Jiggerfelip Sementilla) and Mimaw (Kim Oquendo) as they navigate the treacherous landscape of adolescence including facing off against their bully, Jimbo (Cayden Williams), fostering a first crush on Shiara (Elijah Alejo), hunting ghosts, and seeking out Pico (Lou Veloso) the witch doctor so that they can become men. 

Raya Martin’s Death of Nintendo, written by Valerie Castillo Martinez, is a nostalgia-infused coming-of-age dramedy with an incredible amount of heart behind it.  The core cast all deliver great performances, and as is vital to the success of these films about friendship, they all seem to be getting along and having a genuinely fun time.  Maybe some of that is the fun of getting to play with the strange novelty toys that were all the rage and dressing up in 90s fashions, but a lot of credit needs to be given to Martin as well, for corralling his troupe of young performers and getting them all on the same page.  As the gang finds ways to amuse themselves amidst the blackouts, their adventures are scored by Yudhi Arfani and Zeke Khaseli with an 8-bit inspired composition that highlights the stumblings and successes of their springtime antics.  In this simple examination of a very specific type of friendship, Martin and Martinez tap into the magic of adolescence that can tend to only be looked back on fondly with age.  They elevate the low stakes of the film, and because the cast is so committed, we feel like we are right there on the basketball court with them and therefore the obstacles they are facing are all of a sudden as large to us as they are to them. 

For most of the film, it appears to be Paolo’s story.  Comia Jr. plays the boy with winking innocence as he keeps up his image as a cherub while at home with his overprotective, yet oft-absent, mother (Agot Isidro) while with his friends the quiet boy begins to blossom as he sneaks cigarettes in the locker room, flips through Playboy with his friends, and awkwardly flirts with Shiara while totally unaware of Mimaw’s interest in him.  We cannot help ourselves but fall for the boy’s charm as he fails to realize all that he has in front of him with Mimaw, but then Death of Nintendo, late in its ninety-nine-minute runtime does something unique.  It shifts its perspective from Paolo and his crew to focus more on Mimaw and the third act becomes just as much a story of her growing up as it does for Paolo. 

Mimaw soon realizes that men are disappointing and that more often than not it is the women who are left to clean up their mess.  Wanting to set her own course and be her own person, she makes the difficult decision to leave her world behind and live with her father and his new girlfriend in the United States.  It is hard to say exactly if Martinez intended for this message to be delivered as it is never addressed head-on, but there is so much circumstantial evidence in the plot that it seems impossible for this theme to have gone unnoticed.  Right off the bat, we see Mimaw’s disappointment in Paolo as he pines over Shiara, and having helped her friend grow closer to the most popular girl in school despite the emotional toll it takes on her, Mimaw finds the strength to break free from a society that she sees will be unfulfilling for her.  All around her, there is a lack of father figures not just in her own household but also in Paolo’s.  The argument can be made that the closest thing to a father figure in this film is Kachi’s older brother, Badong (Jude Matthew Servilla), a womanizing deadbeat of which Kachi, Paolo, and Gilligan idolize further cementing in Mimaw’s head that there is little chance she will make men out of these boys. 

Death of Nintendo is a refreshing little film that, while not as streamlined as coming-of-age staples such as Stand by Me (1986) or The Kings of Summer (2013), deals with many of the same themes, and most importantly treats its young characters as fully realized people, even if their decisions are sometimes arrived at through peer pressure and questionable best judgment.  Standing at the precipice of adulthood, the gang is not wholly ignorant of the world they live in, but they choose not to let their differences divide them: Paolo coming from a more western, Christian background or Kachi coming from a lower-income family.  The boys take those elements into account in all their actions, and it does not get in the way of their adventures.  Keeping them all on track, however, is the ever-diligent Mimaw gathering the necessary materials for a Good Friday ghost hunt and making sure Gilligan has the funds to pay for Kachi’s circumcision ritual.  Even with Mimaw’s absence, Death of Nintendo ends on a more hopeful note than Y Tu Mamá También (2001), and while many in the audience can see this as only the first of many schisms this friend group will likely endure, it also gives a chance to reflect on that simpler, yet confusing, time between being a child and a teenager when every decision seemed to be a life-altering one.  With everything in flux, the only constant was your friends who always had your back.