Celebrating ‘all the things you do for love’ at .MOV

Billed as “the first Philippine festival to bring together film, literature, and music" and now on its fourth edition, the .MOV International Film, Literature, and Music Festival lived up to its promise to stand at the nexus of the three genres, with “zero degrees of separation." From Sept. 1 to 6, the festival featured events that included poetry readings, musical performances, and film screenings, some of these happening simultaneously. The festival opening last Sept. 1, the second anniversary of the murder of Alexis Tioseco and Nika Bohinc, at the Podium was marked by several tributes to the young Filipino critic and his Slovenian partner. There was a series of silent film shorts by Tioseco's filmmaker friends to the music of the Brockas, a band of independent filmmakers; in the past, Tioseco had been their drummer. The honorary consul general of Slovenia in the Philippines, Jose Luis Yulo Jr., gave remarks, as did Gertjan Zuilhof of the Rotterdam International Film Festival, where the couple first met.

The .MOV festival originally started with a digital short films competition called Silvershorts, back when it was just about to become the weapon of choice for Filipino independent filmmakers. Around it grew a celebration mainly of the interests of its founder, Khavn de la Cruz. The triennial festival still keeps Silvershorts with Lourd de Veyra, Japanese-American critic Chris Fujiwara, and American film writer Joel Shepard sitting as the competition jury. Jon Lazam won this year's grand prize for the film Hindi sa Atin ang Buwan (The Moon is Not Ours). Alvin Yapan's Panibugho (Jealousy) and Mark Mirabuenos's Gupit (Cut) were given special mention by the jury. This year, the focus was mainly on films by filmmakers who were particularly liked by “Alexis and Nika," as the couple was commonly known. The opening film, Year Without a Summer, a depiction of life in rural Malaysia by director Tan Chui Mui, drew a small but sizeable crowd to a free screening at the Podium. At the UP Film Center, films by directors Roy Andersson and Miguel Gomes were shown in the succeeding days. Friday saw the launch of Under the Storm, an anthology of poetry edited by de la Cruz and poet Joel Toledo. The event brought together prominent names s from the world of literature and film, including several winners of the recently conferred Carlos Palanca Memorial Awards for literature. On Saturday, the 14th Folk U singer-songwriter night was held at the Podium Piazza Musica. Ryan Cayabyab was given a special citation for his work as the “quintessential Filipino singer-songwriter." Among the performers at the event were TOI, Hannah+Gabi (Mikey Amistoso), Vin Dancel, and Pupil's Ely Buendia. His former band-mate in the Eraserheads, Raimund Marasigan, joined American expat musician Jesse Grinter on stage. In remarks delivered at Folk U, the festival's founder emphasized the importance of the event in building the arts community. “[It] is a celebration of friendship, of love, and all the things you do for love," de la Cruz said. On Sunday afternoon, a workshop at Fully Booked High Street brought together film enthusiasts for an afternoon of movies and art. Shepard presented short films on the “explicit and illicit" from independent filmmakers in the US, while Fujiwara discussed alternative and thought-provoking ways of looking at B-movies. Critics Dodo Dayao, Oggs Cruz, and Chard Bolisay, who comprised the Silvershorts selection committee, led a discussion on the Philippine New Wave and the future of Philippine independent cinema. Zuilhof ended the evening on a very creative note with a drawing session, exchanging his own drawings with those of participants whose drawings were notable. Among the local full-length films featured in the festival was Breather, festival founder de la Cruz's film eulogy for his father who died in July. The film premiered last Sept. 3, on what would have been his father's 65th birthday. Several films had their first screenings at the .MOV festival. One is Lav Diaz's Elehiya para sa mga Bisita mula sa Rebolusyon, his shortest film in recent memory, clocking in at only 80 minutes. Jet Layco also premiered Ex Press, an examination of the themes of memory, lost innocence, and trauma, featuring the PNR's newly re-inaugurated Bicol Express. The film Mapang-akit by John Torres was the closing film on Sept. 6. A love story set during a festival on the island of Antique, the full-length feature is the offshoot of a documentary project that Torres made with an Icelandic filmmaker. Lazam's prize-winning short preceded the film of Torres, along with a brief tribute to Alexis and Nica. After the main feature, Torres showed an annotated compilation of footage from an Icelandic filmmaker documenting the making of Lav Diaz's yet-to-be-completed film Agonistes. - YA. GMA News All photos by Jovie Angelica Dayon. Copyright .MOV Festival.