AllMovie

In addition to his career as a filmmaker, The Blossoming of Maximo Oliveros director Auraeus Solito is also an avid science fanatic as evidenced by this film following the students of the Philippines Science High School (locally known as "Pisay") from their freshman year through graduation. Solito himself was a student in the first class to graduate following the defeat of the Marcos dictator in the People Power Revolution, giving him notable insight into the lives of these bright young students. While the freshman year offers little more conflict than who will get top marks and who will get a date for the upcoming dance, the sophomore years gets off to a troubling start as "Ninoy" Aquino - a noted opponent of the Marcos government - is assassinated following a visit to the United States. In the aftermath of the troubling event, the brainy students greet the problem as a math equation by attempting to calculate both the timing and the trajectory of the assassin's bullets. Later, during their junior and senior years, some of the students become increasingly political and take to gathering in the streets of Manila to let their voices be heard. Other students, like an ambitious young theater impresario, are struggling with decidedly more personal issues such as coming to terms with their own sexuality.