Tagalog

Silip (1985)

Synopsis:
Bloodshed and bouncing bosoms abound in this wretchedly violent and nearly pornographic horror film from the Phillipines. The story is set within a tiny village located near an idyllic nude beach where beautiful young women play. Poor local boy Joseph is terribly aroused and becomes obsessed with having his teacher, a virgin. This does not set well with Joseph’s lover, an older widow. Joseph meets his end after he is blamed for butchering a classmate. Joseph’s teacher and one of her friends are in turn blamed for cutting off the lad’s head and burned alive.Read More »

Quote:
Madmen control Manila in 2034 after massive volcanic eruptions have plunged Southeast Asia into darkness.Read More »

Synopsis:Lola Sepa’s grandson has been killed by a cell phone snatcher. Despite being devastated by the sudden violence, she must bear the burden of making the funeral arrangements. She and her family are poor, and there is not enough money for the coffin nor the legal pursuit against the suspected murderer. But the elderly woman is ready to even seek a bank loan to assure both a proper burial and justice for her beloved grandson. Lola Puring is committed to getting her grandson Mateo out of jail, although he has been accused of senselessly murdering Lola Sepa’s grandson. But the poor aged woman doesn’t have the bail money. Each time she visits her grandson in prison to bring him proper meals, it breaks her heart to see him wasting away behind bars with countless others. At the first court hearing, the two grandmothers must face one another. Both frail and poor, each is determined to do everything necessary for her grandson. The future of the case is dependent on grandmotherly love…Read More »

Quote:
One of the best films of 2005. — Paolo Bertolin

In the extraordinary film “IDOL”, all aspirations are stunted and all beyonds are ludicrous. The brilliant farce that is “IDOL” is so profoundly pathetic, it is hilarious. Indeed it is so unusual, provocative and at times shattering that a new aesthetic category might be required here. In “IDOL”, Khavn has hit upon a method adequate to the full-of-shitness of the world and a new modality for realism. — Jonathan BellerRead More »

Quote:
This unique film from acclaimed Filipino director Raya Martin re-imagines his country’s past as an elemental humanist epic.

Fleeing the American invasion of the Philippines in the early 20th Century, a mother and son retreat into the jungle where they make a home. Time passes; a wounded woman is rescued; the mother dies; a child is born. The family survive isolated from the growing chaos engulfing their country, but a storm approaches that threatens their existence as American troops draw nearer…Read More »

Quote:
After spending the last 30 years in prison, Horacia is immediately released when someone else confessed to the crime. Still overwhelmed by her new freedom, she comes to the painful realization that her aristocratic former lover had set her up. As kidnappings targeting the wealthy begin to proliferate, Horacia sees the opportunity to plot her revenge.Read More »

Different students from a high school cleaners group each deal with different pressures of being clean and pure while also discovering that the world is dirty and superficial to begin with.

Barit developed a distinct visual palette for the film that resembles highlighted photocopies (much like books and readings common in Philippine schools). To achieve this, they finalized the offline cut of the film, exported it at eight frames per second, then printed each of those frames out to look like photocopies. What followed was months of manual highlighting of each frame before these were batch-scanned and put in place of the original offline cut.Read More »

Taking leave from their jobs at a gold mine, three workers journey to their home village on foot through the spectacular yet unforgiving wilderness of the mythical island of Hugaw. As time passes and their conversations intensify, buried histories emerge and a sense of psychosis invades the scene. As ever, Lav Diaz’s exquisitely subdued black-and-white images and patient rhythm lend a Brechtian register to the drama; almost always filmed from the same fixed distance, each scene is an immaculate tableau vivant. Behind the film’s folkloric façade, Diaz once again taps into the collective memory of defiant struggles against the tyranny of both contemporary Filipino society and colonial brutality, centred on the timeless image of men walking – one of the key traits of Pan. (Hyun Jin Cho, BFI)Read More »

Peping, a criminology student, is recruited by his schoolmate, Abyong, to work as a part-time errand boy for a local syndicate that collects protection fees from various businesses in Manila. The easy money Peping earns is spent mostly on his girlfriend, Cecille, who’s also a student. Peping decides to marry her, but in order to do so he’ll need more money. Abyong contacts Peping to join a “special project” that pays more than normal…Read More »