The Market Monitor Minding the Nation's Business
The Film Development Council of the Philippines (FDCP) celebrated last week the historic victories scored by Filipino movies in international film festivals this year with an event that gathered the country’s top film talents and saw the formal announcement of a travel-assistance program for filmmakers whose works are picked to participate in such festivals.
During the event, dubbed “Film Ambassadors Night: A Celebration of Philippine Cinema” and held at the Cinematheque Centre Manila in Ermita, FDCP Chairwoman Liza Diño awarded trophies to the teams behind the documentaries, shorts, and feature-length films that won awards at various festivals in the first nine-and-a-half months of 2016.
Leading the honorees were Laz Diaz’s Ang Hele sa Hiwagang Hapis (A Lullaby to the Sorrowful Mystery), which copped the Silver Bear Alfred Bauer Prize at the Berlin International Film Festival in February; Brillante Ma. Mendoza’s Ma’ Rosa, whose star, Jaclyn Jose, clinched the best-actress award at the Cannes Film Festival in May, making her the first performer from Southeast Asia to win an acting accolade there; and Diaz’s Ang Babaeng Humayo (The Woman Who Left), which garnered the Golden Lion prize for best film at the Venice International Film Festival in September, marking the first time a Filipino movie won the top award in any of the three most prestigious film festivals in the world.
Other honorees included Lawrence Fajardo’s Imbisibol (Invisible); Eduardo Roy Jr.’s Pamilya Ordinaryo (Ordinary Family); Mel Chionglo’s Iadya Mo Kami (Deliver Us); Ralston Jover’s Hamog (Dew); Erik Matti’s Honor Thy Father; Joel Lamangan’s Tomodachi (Friend); Raymund Ribay Gutierrez’s Imago (Image); Allan Michael Ibanez and Dexter Paglinawan Hemedez’s 1st Sem; Louie Ignacio’s Area, Child Haus, and Laut; and Sheron Dayoc’s The Crescent Rising.
The Film Ambassadors Night also served as a homecoming party for the films screened at the recent Busan International Film Festival (BIFF), including Hele, Ma’ Rosa, Imago and The Cresent Rising (which won the Mecenat Award for best documentary in the festival’s Wide Angle section), as well as a sendoff party for the movies that will participate in this year’s Tokyo International Film Festival from October 25 to November 3.
In her speech, Diño said 2016 has been “an amazing year for Philippine cinema.”
“Each of our contributions only adds to…an already great Filipino film heritage that is constantly growing in scale and quantity, and quality. The present time harkens back to the Golden Age of Philippine Cinema more than ever,” she told the attendees.
Also during the event, Diño officially launched the council’s International Film Festival Program, which, she said, “will provide assistance to Filipino filmmakers and their films that have been accepted into foreign film festivals.”
The Filipino delegates to this year’s BIFF were the first recipients of the program, the FDCP said in a statement.
Under this program, the beneficiaries can get one or two round-trip plane tickets—depending on the length of their works and which section of the festival they are placed in—and hotel accommodation for three days. In return, the beneficiaries will be required to participate in the FDCP’s film-mentorship program.
“Through this [film-mentorship] program, we shall face together the challenge of having Filipino films be better [appreciated] by the [filmgoing] population as a whole,” Diño said.
“I hope that we will all work together in uniting the country toward the revival of the Golden Age of Philippine Cinema,” she added. ALVIN I. DACANAY