CineKabalen to honor Elwood Perez

Legendary Kapampangan filmmaker Elwood Perez, whose career spans an unparalleled five decades, will receive a lifetime achievement award during the CineKabalen Kapampangan Film Festival this Saturday, February 18 at the Holy Angel University.

Perez, a native of Mabalacat City, will be honored for his longevity, his films that were both artistic and commercial success, his role in ending the bomba (pornographic) trend prevalent in the 1960s, and in launching and resurrecting the careers of film actors and actresses.

“Elwood Perez started making movies in 1970 together with Lino Brocka, Ishmael Bernal and Celso Ad. Castillo,” Robby Tantingco, director of the Center for Kapampangan Studies, said.

“Today, 47 years later, all his contemporaries are long gone but he is still reinventing his style and experimenting with the passion of a young indie filmmaker,” he added.

The CineKabalen is the annual competition of Kapampangan short films founded by award-winning film director Jason Paul Laxamana more than six years ago.

Its alumni include some of the most promising indie filmmakers in the country today like Bor Ocampo, Carlo Enciso Catu, Petersen Vargas, Arvin Gagui, Justine Dizon, Cheska Salangsang, and Raymond Anunciacion.

Elwood Perez was prolific for 20 straight years, throughout the 1970s and the 1980s, with all his movies making money and winning awards. Then he continued making films in the 1990s and the 2000s and 2010s.

“No other filmmaker here and maybe even abroad can match that. I am sure he will still be making films in his sixth decade, in the 2020s,” Tantingco said.

Perez launched the so-called bold movies in the 1970s which featured the unlikeliest stars like Amalia Fuentes, Boots Anson Roa, Pilar Pilapil, Vilma Santos, Gina Alajar, Cherie Gil, Alma Moreno, Rio Locsin, Lorna Tolentino and Christopher de Leon. Their success at the box-office put an end to the reign of bomba films and energized the flagging careers of stars and superstars.

Perez directed some of the biggest hits of Nora Aunor (“Lollipops and Roses and Burong Talangka,” “Mahal Mo Mahal Ko,” “Till We Meet Again”) and Vilma Santos (“Lipad Darna Lipad,” “Masarap Masakit ang Umibig,” “Pinay American Style,” “Pakawalan Mo Ako”).

He launched with Regal Films the so-called Regal Babies (Maricel Soriano, Snooky, Dina Bonnevie, Gabby Concepcion, William Martinez) and won critical acclaim for such films as “Bilangin ang Bituin sa Langit” and “Ang Totoong Buhay ni Pacita M.” His experimental films “Otso”and “Esoterika: Maynila,” made in 2013 and 2014, respectively, also impressed critics.

“Elwood Perez is a source of pride for Kapampangans who see themselves in his life of struggle to achieve the pinnacle of success and stay there for a long time,” Tantingco said.

“His award at CineKabalen will connect him to young Kapampangan filmmakers who will see him as a mentor and inspiration,” he furthered.

CineKabalen, co-sponsored by the HAU CKS and KACIMOV, has featured acting and scriptwriting workshops in the last two weekends and will show the competing films in the afternoon of February 18 at the PGN Auditorium, Holy Angel University.

The festival’s closing film, Petersen Vargas’“2 Cool 2 Be 4gotten,” Cinema One Best Film, will be shown at 4:00 p.m. followed by the closing ceremonies where Elwood Perez will receive his lifetime achievement award and the winners in the short-film competition will be announced.

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Erika Mariel Gines