Independent films dominate this year’s MMFF
AFTER A controversial 2015 run, the country’s premier film festival is back with changes that some might say sees the festival returning to its roots — that is, selecting quality works over commercial viability. Most of this year’s eight finalists are independent films rather than products from the big movie studios.
Last year’s Metro Manila Film Festival (MMFF) saw Erik Matti’s
Honor Thy Father disqualified from consideration as the Best Picture because it had participated in another local film festival. This resulted in a backlash that prompted a congressional hearing. This, alongside the issue of “ticket-swapping” between two box office front-runners, Jose Javier Reyes’s My Bebe Love and Wenn Deramas’
Beauty and Bestie, led to a number of changes in the festival including a new executive committee headed by film critic Nicanor Tiongson, and a new mission and vision statement focusing on “artistic excellence,” “audience development,” “quality Filipino films,” and “sustainability of the Philippine film industry,” according to an InterAksyon story dated April 14.
An apparent result of the changes is that the 2016 run is bereft of the usual big name productions which usually rake in the most money during the two week festival in December. Among the
notable films that did not make the cut were Vice Ganda and Coco Martin’s film Super Parental Guidance, Vic Sotto’s Enteng Kabisote 10 and the Abangers, and Ai-Ai de
las Alas’s Our Mighty Yaya.
The film festival, held during the last two weeks of the year throughout Metro Manila and many of the major cities nationwide, shows the festival entries exclusively, with foreign films locked out from movie theaters. This exclusivity translates into an economic bonanza for the festival films, although not all reap the bounty.
In recent years, the film festival has specialized in light-weight money- making crowd- pleasers like the Enteng Kabisote and
Shake, Rattle and Roll series, featuring comics like Vic Sotto and Ai-Ai de las Alas, but it was once known for giving a chance to some of the country’s best filmmakers to reach a wider public for their movies than they otherwise would have had. Eddie Romero’s Ganito Kami Noon, Paano Kayo Ngayon in 1976, Mike de Leon’s Kisapmata in 1981, and Ishmael Bernal’s Himala in 1982, were among many other festival films that are generally considered among the best Filipino movies made.
In another major change, this year the finalists were chosen from 27 finished films. In previous years, entries were selected
from screenplays, with most directors filming the movies only once they were chosen as finalists. The 2016 MMFF entries are:
Oro, a political thriller by Alvin Yapan; Vince & Kath & James, a Star Cinema romantic comedy by Theodore Boborol;
Ang Babae Sa Septic Tank 2:
Forever is Not Enough, the sequel to the award-winning Cinemalaya entry in 2011 by Marlon Rivera, which is a production of Quantum Films alongside the Tuko, Butchi Boy and MJM Production outfits;
Die Beautiful, a dark comedy by Jun Robles Lana which competed at the recently concluded Tokyo International Film Festival, bagging a Best Actor Award for Paolo Ballesteros and an Audience Choice Award (the rule that disqualified movies previously shown in other film festivals has been scrapped);
Kabisera, a drama directed by Arturo San Agustin and Real Florido; Saving Sally, a romantic comedy mixing live action and animation by Avid Liongoren; Seklusyon, a horror thriller by Erik Matti; and,
Sunday Beauty Queen, a documentary by Baby Ruth Villarama about a beauty pageant for domestic workers in Hong Kong. —