...the PH top grossing film of all time

How Hong Kong-set ‘Hello, Love, Goodbye’ became the Philippines’ top-grossing film of all time

• The film, which was also shot in the city, is the tale of a domestic worker and a playboy bartender, both Filipinos, who fall in love
• Experts and fans say it captures the lives of overseas Filipino workers, who finally feel seen after often being regarded as invisible in their daily jobs

Crystal Tai
South China Morning Post 
08 September 2019

Hello, Love, Goodbye is the hit film about the romance between a millennial

domestic worker

and a playboy bartender – and it’s now

the Philippines

’ top-grossing film of all time. Filmed and set in Hong Kong, the movie stars Kathryn Bernardo as Joy and Alden Richards as Ethan, a Filipino couple who inadvertently fall for each another while chasing their dreams and trying to make ends meet in the city.

‘Hello, Love, Goodbye’ stars Kathryn Bernardo as Joy and Alden Richards as Ethan. Photo: YouTube

Since its July 31 release, the film has earned more than US$44.8 million worldwide. Besides the Philippines, Hello, Love, Goodbye has also become the

highest-grossing Philippine film

in Australia, New Zealand and Britain.

In the Southeast Asian nation, 10 million people – a tenth of the population – work abroad, searching for better pay and opportunities to support their families. These overseas Filipino workers (OFWs) send home up to US$31 billion every year, roughly 10 per cent of the nation’s GDP, according to a 2018 National Geographic report.

Toni Magsaysay, a Manila-based graphic designer in her 20s who did her bachelor’s thesis on the lives of OFWs, said many Filipinos would be able to relate to the film.

“Many families have relatives working overseas,” she said. “They know the sacrifices made by each end. But at the same time, they do not entirely share all of the hardships from both sides, as to not make both sides worry too much.

While many OFWs are nurses, engineers and ship workers, Magsaysay adds that the majority are domestic workers.

Hong Kong, which employs 213,000 Filipinos as domestic workers according to 2019 statistics, is one of the top destinations for OFWs. E.J.R. David, a Filipino-American professor who teaches cross-cultural psychology at the University of Alaska, Anchorage, said many Filipinos see more opportunities in the likes of Hong Kong and Singapore than they do at home.

“In addition to featuring the plight of overseas domestic workers, which many folks can relate with, [Hello, Love, Goodbye] also tackles issues that are more universal like love, family, individuality, responsibility, and how they are all intertwined,” he said.

“Many of us can relate to these universal themes, because many of us in the diaspora are constantly trying our best to navigate this delicately tangled web of in our lives.”

David said that while the film was popular among Filipinos because it gave them a glimpse of what their loved ones might be going through, OFWs themselves would also find it powerful because they would “finally feel seen and appreciated when they are often regarded as invisible in their daily work”.

Hello, Love, Goodbye also breaks down stereotypes surrounding OFWs, according to Eian John Pascua, a graphic designer and fan of the film who is based in the Philippines. He said OFWs are often assumed to be earning a significantly higher amount of money, and are therefore expected to foot the bill for their families when it comes to items like new cellphones or shoes.

“That was one of the issues discussed subtly in the movie, when Joy’s siblings were asking if she could buy them stuff that was a bit pricey,” Pascua said.

For graphic designer Magsaysay, the film was also realistic in its depiction of the more gritty aspects of being a domestic worker living in Hong Kong. She cites a scene in which the characters picnic in crowded Victoria Park on their day off. “I remember my sister, who once lived in Hong Kong for a teaching job, telling me, ‘How they sit on cardboard [in the park] is really real’ when we watched the movie together.”

Due to their sacrifices, OFWs are often regarded as modern day heroes by their families, said David, the academic. “The country recognizes that it is largely dependent on the money that overseas Filipino workers send back,” he said, adding that research suggests more than a third of the Philippines’ population receives money from relatives working abroad.

David also points out the problem with many Filipinos having to part from their families just to survive.

“It is unfortunate the Philippines as a country has become dependent on this sacrifice, [that its] largest export is its people [and] providing for their family means having to leave them behind,” he said. “It’s a sad life when you realize that in order for your family to survive, then you need to serve others.”