Bold selections in Filipino fest
The Filipino Film Festival, a grand showcase for the latest in aesthetically and politically inventive Filipino cinema, returns to San Francisco for its sixth year at the Yerba Buena Center for the Arts from Thursday, Aug. 17, through Sept. 3.
This year’s festival has been co-curated by YBCA film and video curator Joel Sheperd and Philippinesbased film critic Philbert Dy. The films shed an artistic light on the recent political and human rights crises that have taken place during Rodrigo Duterte’s presidency.
“As the indelible specter of dictatorship continues to cast a shadow on the nation, filmmakers continue to tell stories that bring to light, in ways both overt and subtle, the injustices that Filipinos face every day,” Dy said in a statement.
Exciting films at the festival include “Forbidden Memory,” a documentary on the little-known 1974 massacre in the town of Malisbong, where 1,500 citizens were killed by the Philippines army; “Seklusyon,” a religious horror parable directed by Erik Matti (“On the Job,” “Honor Thy Father”); and Brillante Mendoza’s “Ma’Rosa,” which won a Jaclyn Rose Award for best actress at the 2016 Cannes Film Festival.
A special event, “Inside the War on Drugs,” with Manila photojournalist Raffy Lerma, is scheduled for 1 p.m. Sunday, Aug. 20.
“Pagdating Sa Dulo (At the Top),” the 1971 debut feature of Ishmael Bernal, will be screened in a new digital restoration on Aug. 27. American moviegoers have not yet been adequately exposed to the riches of the Philippines’ cinematic history. “At the Top,” about a stripper (Rita Gomez) groomed to be an actress during a time of toxic political strife, promises to be an essential rediscovery of a shamefully overlooked corner of world cinema.
The festival will conclude the weekend of Sept. 2-3 in remarkable style, with two screenings of Lav Diaz’s most recent work, the eighthour epic “A Lullaby to the Sorrowful Mystery.” Diaz traces the history and future of the Philippine Republic through the characters of one of its most nationally recognized classics, José Rizal’s “El Filibusterismo,” written in 1891. The film won the Alfred Bauer Prize at the 2016 Berlin Film Festival, awarded to films that “open new perspectives on cinematic art.” Diaz’s film will be presented with a one-hour intermission at 4 p.m.
For more information on tickets and screenings, go to www.ybca.org. “Rebecca” and “Marnie”: The Castro Theatre screens two of Alfred Hitchcock’s weirdest psychological thrillers: “Rebecca” (Daphne du Maurier’s classic ghost yarn, starring Joan Fontaine and Laurence Olivier, and produced by David O. Selznick) and “Marnie” (the second of two unsettling, expressionist masterpieces Hitchcock made with actor Tippi Hedren in the 1960s).
“Rebecca” was Hitchcock’s first Hollywood film and won Selznick an Oscar for best picture, just a year after his “Gone With the Wind” sweep. This creepy tale of a woman forced to fit the image of her lover’s ghostly past love is a dress rehearsal for the more ecstatic and American-as-hell “Vertigo” and “The Birds.”
“Marnie” features Hitchcock at his most off-puttingly artificial — with a schizoid, swirling Bernard Herrmann score to boot. (This would mark the last HitchHerrmann collaboration; they had a falling-out in 1966 over the rather dismal “Torn Curtain.”) The subject matter of “Marnie” is disturbingly close to the director’s heart: Men (Sean Connery) trying to dominate mysterious chic women. Hedren’s Marnie is less subject and more object, something to be sliced up and looked at by the unfeeling camera. This unforgettable, tricky tale of a brutalized woman will leave you feeling unclean for a long time. “Rebecca” 7 p.m., “Marnie” 4:30 and 9:20 p.m. Sunday, Aug. 20. $9-$12. The Castro Theatre, 429 Castro St., S.F. (415) 621-6120. www. castrotheatre.com. “Antonio Gaudí”: Hiroshi Teshigahara’s sublime 1984 visual essay on the celebrated Catalan architect. The camera of Teshigahara (“Woman in the Dunes,” “The Face of Another”) films in and around Gaudí’s schools, houses and parks, tracing the gentle slopes and flowing curves of Gaudí’s architectural marvels, including the still-unfinished Sagrada Familia cathedral in Barcelona. This 72-minute film is quietly hypnotic, like a hushed Mass held in a Church of Aesthetic Wonder. It features an eerie, unforgettable score by the Japanese composer Toru Takemitsu. (A word of warning: There is no narration, so there’s not much context on Gaudí beyond his impeccable forms, which speak for themselves. If you need a quick primer on the man, watch Ken Russell’s 15-minute documentary short on Gaudí, made for the BBC in 1961 and available in two parts on YouTube.) 6:30 p.m. Friday, Aug. 18, and 5 p.m. Aug. 27. $7-$12. Berkeley Art Museum and Pacific Film Archive, 2155 Center St., Berkeley. (510) 642-0808. www.bampfa.berkeley.edu.