QCinema Film Festival 2018

By MARIA PAMELA S. REYES FOR the youth, death seems to be out of arm’s reach. It is a mere figment of their imagination, a problem they will only need to face when they get older. They tend to look forward to the future and to the various goals that keep them grounded. Once a person gets older, however, everything changes. Their perspective in life shifts and they sometimes start to accept where their choices have led them. Age may also make them wonder if they could have had a different story or a different ending to their life. In…

By RYAN PIOLO U. VELUZ FROM the main door of the church, wooden statues of Jesus Christ and various saints draw throngs of devotees and parishioners, either due to their divine significance or embellishment of sacred details and the linens of royalties attached to their lifeless structures. Illuminated by candles and elusive light bulbs, these inanimate sculptures seem to come to life through people’s extreme devotion and expression of faith. Director Hiyas Bagabaldo’s entry to this year’s QCinema International Film Festival, Pag-ukit sa Paniniwala, is a documentary film that explores the different facets and expressions of Catholic faith in the…

By LORRAINE C. SUAREZ DEATH is a paradox—it is a concept known to everybody, and yet, it remains a mystery. It is something that each person is very much aware of but not something that is truly understood. Thus, one tends to observe it in a manner convenient for primal instincts: through fear and terror, emotions that are similarly observed when dealing with something in the darkness, something unknown. For 44-year-old Sonya (Marietta Subong), death is but a means to make a living. She is the proprietor of her family’s funeral home and the sole breadwinner in a household of…

By ISABELL ANDREA M. PINE THE SPANISH colonization of the Philippines centered around God, gold, and glory. One cannot deny how these played a big role in the country’s history and how they created a lasting impact on Filipinos. This begs the question of whether or not modern-day Filipinos still have a hold of their true culture and how much of their identity is influenced by the colonizers of the past. For this reason, Masla A Papanok retells the destruction of culture and the reality of forgetting it through the perspective of two representations of the Filipinos’ beginnings. Set in…