Now on it’s fourth year of giving filmmakers a showcase for their talent and creativity, Cinemalaya is growing not only in the amount of of applicants but also in the crowds that watch the film. The Festival also added 3 awards: best music, best supporting actor, and best supporting actress. The Cinemalaya Film Festival has given players in the independent film scene something to hope for.
Past Cinemalaya participant Tara Illenberger’s full length entry, Brutus, is a personal film and advocacy of two Mangyan kids that smuggle wood for illegal loggers in the mountains of Mindoro. Ned Trespeces was inspired by his two years as a call center gent to craft a comedy titled My Fake American Accent. A former scriptwriter for a major Filipino film company, Ned mentions that being in the call center industry pays much better than scriptwriting.
20 finalists — 10 in the full length category and another 10 in the short film category — will compete for the ultimate standing as 2008’s indie filmmaker. Each finalist was given Php 500,000 as seed investment for their film. With a limited budget, Ned and writing partner Onnah Valera as well as Tara unanimously agreed that family is an important aspect when it comes to getting food, lending money for projects and most importantly acting in the films — for free.
Filipino filmmakers not only have to compete for a spot in the limelight nowadays but they must also compete with foreign films that come to our country. In the ’70s and ’80s the Philippines was the third largest country to produce films with an average of 200-plus movies a year.
Nowadays the local film industry annually makes an average of only 50 films. The films shown by Cinemalaya prove to everyone that Filipinos have what it takes to be a leader in the film industry.
Paris Cinema 2008 has chosen the Philippines as the focus country of their own film festival: out of 41 Filipino films, 10 of them are from Cinemalaya. In fact, Ranchero, by Michael Christian Cardoz, has been chosen for the Paris Project Screening, which is a private exhibition for French buyers and industries.
The Cinemalaya Film Festival is worth watching because you get to experience the gift Filipinos have in making films that are simultaneously endearing and thought-provoking. The location, the problems, the humor, the food, the fashion, the language are 100% Filipino. Indie filmmakers not only need money to create a film but they need the support of Filipino moviegoers. Why watching something you can’t relate to when you can have films that are for and by your own countrymen?
The Cinemalaya Film Festival runs from July 11 until July 20, 2008 at the CCP venues. Fore more information, call 551-7930.