Maybe I just have too much faith in hugot culture, but I thought LSS would be a blockbuster hit. It has become almost a rite of passage for young Filipinos to cry to at least one Ben&Ben song (I’ve personally bawled at two), so having a feature film to commemorate our collective catharsis, scored by… Continue reading Pista ng Pelikulang Pilipino 2019: ‘LSS’ – Love? In This Economy?
Doña Atang (Anita Linda) is turning 100 years old. Her one wish: to celebrate it with the people she worked with in her earlier years of producing films, a task her aspiring filmmaker grandson (Enchong Dee) has taken the liberty of granting. As his quest to find members to populate the party begins, so does… Continue reading Pista ng Pelikulang Pilipino 2019: ‘Circa’ – 100 Years of Life and Philippine Cinema
The film begins mysteriously. We are introduced to a man, maybe in his late 40s or early 50s, seated in a dimly lit room, talking to an unseen person. The latter is a "principled" killer, he says, and so he trusts them as he offers them a handsome amount of money to end his unfinished… Continue reading Pista ng Pelikulang Pilipino 2019: ‘Watch Me Kill’ – Of Fractured Identities and Moralities
For the longest time, regional filmmakers have decried imperial Manila's hegemony in the local film industry. The media focuses heavily on Tagalog-language films, in effect neglecting films in other local languages even if the latter have been important to Philippine cinema since its inception. With the advent of digital filmmaking, however, regional filmmakers have found… Continue reading Pista ng Pelikulang Pilipino 2019: ‘Pagbalik’ – Dull and Unpolished
Demon clowns: they're just like us. At least that's what It Chapter 2 tells us after three hours of listening to a bunch of beautiful people call themselves losers over and over again. Andy Muschietti’s follow up to his 2017 Stephen King classic is a heartwarming exploration of human fear, friendship, and how believing that… Continue reading ‘It Chapter 2’: A Hearty Horror Flick
By winning the prestigious Palme d’Or at this year’s Cannes Film Festival for his highly ambitious and sophisticated film Parasite, filmmaker Bong Joon-ho has firmly cemented his place in world cinema. Indeed, the esteemed South Korean auteur is one of the most venerated directors of our time, his filmography a combination of arthouse and commercial… Continue reading Bong Joon-ho Films Ranked from Good to Best
One of my favorite things about Makoto Shinkai’s narratives is how it centers our two leads and the way he allows the world to gravitate amongst and against them. In Weathering With You, the world expands and allows us to realize that it is bigger than our two leads. Yet, they persist. They persist in… Continue reading ‘Weathering With You’: Finding Love Against Chaotic Weather Systems
Sine Liwanag 