A COMMUNICATION senior from the UST Faculty of Arts and Letters has won three accolades in this year’s Cinema Primera Regional Film Festival.
Communication senior Christian Lloyd Dominguez received the prize for best direction for his short film “Almira!”, a supernatural and family-drama film about a teenager who finds herself in the middle of withdrawals due to a drug that keeps her emotionally stable.
“It highlights the family dynamics of a mother who is trying her best to make ends meet but at the same time trying to [do] the best for her child, not wanting her to suffer any more. Basically, it tells a warm yet bittersweet message: The deeper the desire, the louder the world breaks,” Dominguez told The Flame.
The film, produced by At The Back Productions, was also recognized as one of the viewers’ screening favorites and bagged the Bahaghari Award, an accolade given to the “most inclusive and diverse narrative or representation in a film.”
Dominguez said this achievement “reignited” a love inside him, which urged him to try making films again after graduating from the University.
“I know that the flame within me, though once extinguished, can always reignite the moment my mind wills it to burn again,” the fourth-year Communication student said.
A former director at the University’s online television unit UST Tiger TV, Dominguez advised aspiring filmmakers not to give up even if they get “knocked down over and over again.”
“This journey will make you—and break you. You won’t always get what you want… If you truly want to thrive in this career, prepare yourself for heartbreak. A lot of it. But whatever happens, don’t give up. Because I believe that God has bigger and better things in store for you—if you just let Him in.”
Cinema Primera has been an initiative spearheaded by Multimedia Arts students from the University of Perpetual Help – Molino since 2018 to put a spotlight on films created by senior high school and college students from Calabarzon.
“For the longest time, the filmmaking scene was dominated by Metro Manila… Calabarzon filmmakers deserve more support. [T]hey deserve the same thriving community and mentorship and guidance and love that the student filmmakers of Metro Manila get,” the organization wrote in a Facebook post.
“Almira!”, along with 44 other film entries, was streamed at the University of Perpetual Help – Molino campus from April 21 to 23. The films were 15 to 20 minutes long, spoken in either English, Filipino, or Calabarzon dialects (with English subtitles) and were created during the academic year 2024-2025.
The judges assessed the entries based on narrative and storytelling, direction, technical excellence, performance, cultural resonance and overall impact. F — with reports from Christian Querol
