Cine Veritas Human Rights Film Festival 2006

UP Film Institute holds annual human rights fest

Cine Veritas Human Rights Film Festival 2006
December 5, 2006 to December 9, 2006

The UP Film Institue holds its annual celebration for human rights with
the Cine Veritas Human Rights Film Festival 2006 set from December 5
Tuesday to December 9 Saturday. Now on its fourth year, Cine Veritas continues to present for its latest edition a wide variety of films that seek to confront the contemporary world’s most pressing social issues.

Opening festivities feature the Philippine premiere (Dec 5 Tue 7 p.m.)
of Lelaki Komunis Terakhir (The Last Communist) from Malaysia’s
digital filmmaking pioneer Amir Muhammad. The film that has made the rounds of
prestigious international filmfests beginning with the world premiere
in Berlin last February provides a rare account of the early life and legacy of
the banned Communist Party of Malaya’s exiled leader Chin Peng through
testimony and song. The screening will be preceded by the world premiere
of Martyn See’s Speakers Cornered—a documentary short subject on
pro-democracy activists in Singapore about to stage a protest during
the recent World Bank and International Monetary Fund’s annual meet.

Succeeding days are replete with more screening highlights. The League
of Filipino Students hallmarks on Dec 6 Wed at 2 p.m. a double feature
with ABC 5’s State of War and ST Exposure’s Alingawngaw ng mga Punglo.
State of War—the 2006 documentary made with correspondents Geann
Pineda, Jim Libiran, Jade Lopez and Ed Lingao—shows the effects of the
national government’s all-out war policy against the CPP-NPA-NDF on the lives
of innocent civilians and unarmed activists. Set in the Southern Tagalog
region, Alingawngaw ng mga Punglo discusses the Comprehensive Agreement
on the Respect for Human Rights and International Humanitarian Law
vis-à-vis the human rights violations committed against civilians allegedly by
the country’s armed forces.

Another Philippine premiere unveils courtesy of the Embassy of France
in the Philippines Rithy Panh’s S-21: The Khmer Rouge Killing Machine
(Dec 6 Wed 7 p.m. with repeat on Dec 8 Fri at 10 a.m.)—a close-up
look at the Khmer Rouge prison camps in Cambodia of the mid-1970s. Attempting
to make peace between Cambodian torture survivors and the Khmer Rouge
soldiers who brutalized them, the film has won numerous awards and distinctions
including Francois Chalais Award—2003 Festival de Cannes; Golden
Dove, Fipresci Prize—2003 Leipzig DOK Festival; Special Jury Prize—2003
Copenhagen IFF; Best Documentary—2003 Valladolid IFF; Best
Documentary—2003 European Awards; 2003 Prix Italia; Human Rights
Award—2004 Buenos Aires International Festival of Independent Cinema;
Humanitarian Award—2004 Hong Kong IFF; 2004 Prix Albert Londres.

Homegrown true-to-life classics are represented with the special commemorative screening (Dec 7 Thu 2 p.m.) of The Moises Padilla Story directed by
National Artist Gerardo de Leon and the 35th anniversary screening (Dec 7 Thu 7
p.m.) of Asedillo directed by Celso Ad Castillo and starring National Artist
Fernando Poe Jr.

The Moises Padilla Story recounts the travails of an underdog politico
battling a corrupt governor with a private army that enforces his repressive
rule in their province. Asedillo tracks the story of a schoolteacher rebelling
against the American colonial government and forming a militant peasant group.

Apart from distinct screenings, the Film and Human Rights forum on Dec
8 Fri at 2 p.m. serves as a key attraction with a panel composed of Amir
Muhammad, Nanette Matilac, Kiri Lluch Dalena and Sharaad Kuttan. Libay Linsangan
Cantor of the UP Film Institute acts as the moderator.

Full slates of international shorts plus an Asian shorts program on
politics of oppression and a Philippine shorts selection tackling kids and poverty
are also screened throughout the festival. In addtion to the opening film,
visiting filmmaker Amir Muhammad has a surprise film to preview on Dec 8 Fri at 7 p.m.

The Center for Environmental Awareness and Education takes part in this
year’s Cine Veritas with an acclaimed twinbill of new works on Dec 9 Sat at 10
a.m. Nanette Matilac’s Memories of the Sea digs into the plight of the
Badjaw who—like most cultural communities pushed away from their roots to
desperate subsistence by war, poverty and oppression—suffer a far
greater loss of heritage not only for themselves but also for the country, the
continent they belong to and for that matter the rest of the world. Karie Garnier’s The Silent Natives of Fuga dramatizes the tale of a Filipina and her Canadian husband whose journey to paradise turns into a nightmare as they encounter the unlivable rules imposed on the 2,000 poverty-stricken inhabitants of Fuga Island.

Closing film on Dec 9 Sat at 7 p.m. is Raya Martin’s Maicling Pelicula nang
Ysang Indio Nacional—the Grand Prize Winner of Lino Micciche Award at
the 2006 Pesaro International Festival of New Cinema. The indie gem charts
three phases of an Indio’s life during the Spanish colonial times first as an
impressionable child church bell-ringer, then a pubescent caught in the growing pressures of the revolution and finally an actor for a community theater group escaping his troubled soul.

The Cine Veritas Human Rights Film Festival 2006 is a UP Film Institute
undertaking with the Office of the UP Diliman Chancellor and the UP
Diliman Office for Initiatives in Culture and the Arts as main partners.

Cine Veritas Human Rights Film Festival 2006
Truth sets us all free...

For more details about the Cine Veritas Human Rights Film Festival 2006, contact:
University of the Philippines Film Institute
(Member, CILECT/International Association of Film and Television
Schools)
Plaridel Hall, Ylanan Road, UP Diliman, Quezon City
Tel: 9818500 (UP Trunkline) local 2669, 2670; 9206863 (Telefax)
Cine Adarna, Magsaysay and Osmena Avenues, UP Diliman, Quezon City
Tel: 9818500 (UP Trunkline) local 4286, 4289; 9262722 (Telefax)