Joel Saracho
2021
Pektus
Sabs Quesada
Nonie Buencamino, Jojit Lorenzo
The story of a day in the lives of two men in the city -both proud, indifferent, and bound by the confines of their milieu and their choices in life- and their incidental yet preordained meeting in a one-way alley that would change their lives thereafter. Raising questions of how far people have control over what happens in their lives, the film seeks to explore circumstance versus choice, breaking points, and second chances.
Pektus
From What Is Before
Lav Diaz
Perry Dizon, Roeder Camanag
The Philippines, 1972. Mysterious things are happening in a remote barrio. Wails are heard from the forest, cows are hacked to death, a man is found bleeding to death at the crossroad and houses are burned. Ferdinand E. Marcos announces Proclamation No. 1081 putting the entire country under Martial Law.
From What Is Before
A Lullaby to the Sorrowful Mystery
Lav Diaz
Piolo Pascual, John Lloyd Cruz
Andres Bonifacio y de Castro is considered to be one of the most influential proponents in the struggle against Spanish colonial rule in the Philippines during the late nineteenth century. Bonifacio’s widow is searching for her husband’s missing dead body; as she and her followers stumble deeper into the jungle, they become entangled in the dense thicket of their own guilt and responsibility. The Spanish governor tries to play off the various rebel factions and their utopian visions against each other. At the same time, a badly wounded companion of Bonifacio reflects upon the victims a revolution inevitably creates. Mythology, facts and a vibrant sense of history merge.
A Lullaby to the Sorrowful Mystery
Signal Rock
Chito S. Roño
Christian Bables, Daria Ramirez
Intoy was left to take care of his parents when his sister Vicky leaves to work overseas. Eventually, like many women in the island, Vicky married a foreigner thinking it will solve all her family’s problems. Living in a remote area, Intoy can only get in touch with his sister by scrambling atop strange rock formations on the island.
Signal Rock
Contestant #4
Kaj Palanca, Jared Joven
Joel Saracho, Elijah Canlas
A young boy frequently visits an old man who lives alone, keeping him always in good company. One night, he chances upon the old man watching a dated clip of himself as a cross-dressing boy. This sparks within the young boy an interest to find out more about the old man's past. What he ultimately discovers aids both him and the old man towards a richer understanding of how the weight of life and identity should be carried.
Contestant #4
The Woman in the Septic Tank 3: The Real Untold Story of Josephine Bracken
Marlon Rivera, Marlon Rivera
Eugene Domingo, Tony Labrusca
“Sequel na, series pa? It’s just a suggestion.” Watch as Eugene Domingo comes full circle as she completes the saga in this third installment of Ang Babae Sa Septic Tank. Witness her in a new light as she tells the real untold story of Josephine Bracken in this iWant original series.
Ang Babae sa Septic Tank 3: The Real Untold Story of Josephine Bracken
Lola Igna
Eduardo W. Roy Jr.
Angie Ferro, Yves Flores
Lola Igna is a foul-mouthed and stubborn woman who is eager to die but her neighbors are hung up on her winning "the oldest living grandmother in the world." Her long-lost great-great-grandson, Tim, is an aspiring vlogger who wants to latch on her now-famous grandma but ends up giving her a new reason to live.
Lola Igna
Tandem
King Palisoc
JM de Guzman, Nico Antonio
In the traffic-laden streets of Metro Manila, two brothers use the chaos of the city roads as a smokescreen for their shady occupation tandem robbers on motorbike. But when a robbery goes sour, the brothers are forced to graduate from low level thieves to high profile hit men in an act that tests both their resolve and their relationship.
Tandem
Season of the Devil
Lav Diaz
Piolo Pascual, Shaina Magdayao
In the late 70s, a gang of militias, under the control of the military, terrorizes a remote village in the Philippines. The terror being inflicted on the populace is not just corporal but intensely psychological as well. They were constantly fed with apocryphal tales about the village leader. A few souls are not giving up. They are fighting. The poet/teacher/activist, Hugo Haniway, decides to find out the truth about the disappearance of his wife. A love story set in the darkest period of Philippine history, the Marcos Dictatorship. The narrative and the characters are a composite of real events and real people that happened and existed during the period. A Filipino rock opera.
Season of the Devil
Ang Hupa
Lav Diaz
Piolo Pascual, Joel Lamangan
It is the year 2034 AD and Southeast Asia has been in the dark for the last three years, literally, because the sun hasn’t shone as a result of massive volcanic eruptions at the Celebes Sea in 2031. Madmen control countries, communities, enclaves and bubble cities. Cataclysmic epidemics razed over the continent. Millions have died and millions have left.
The Halt
Singing in Graveyards
Bradley Liew
Pepe Smith, Mercedes Cabral
Pepe, a 68-year-old impersonator of a Filipino rock legend, lives alone on the borders of reality, imagination and mysticism. One day, he is finally given the chance to open for the rock legend’s concert but he must do something neither of them has done before – write a love song.
Singing in Graveyards
