This Week @ Cinekatipunan March 26-31

THIS WEEK AT CINEKATIPUNAN
March 26- 31, 2007

Mervin Espina opens the week with the South East Asian
program, featuring six short works by Malaysian
independent filmmaker and writer Amir Muhammed. Sine
Patriyotiko presents their winning entry to last
year’s Gawad CCP Para sa Alternatibong Pelikula
[Documentary Video] awards, Mula Third Avenue Hanggang
Dulo.

Wednesday’s treat is a back-to-back screening of short
works by young acclaimed filmmakers Raya Martin and
John Torres, followed by a screening of compelling
television documentaries on the insurgency and counter
insurgency war to be presented by Southern Tagalog
Exposure on Thursday. Friday the 30th is Elvert de la
Cruz Banares’ day, with eXtermination2, a marathon of
his short works.

Mag:net caps the month of March on Saturday with an
arsenal of short experimental works by campus-based
filmmakers from KALAYAAN College and the College of
St. Benilde (curated by Jay Ticar and Elvert Banares).

Held Mondays to Saturdays at Mag:net Café Katipunan,
Cinekatipunan screenings start at 5:30 PM.
While the film screenings are free, viewers are
encouraged to make voluntary contributions for the
honoraria of the featured filmmakers. For questions or
comments aboutCinekatipunan write to
sinag_haraya@ yahoo.com.

Cinekatipunan programs precede Mag:net Café's nightly
holding of Live Performances by well-known and
emerging bands and musicians. Mag:net Café is located
along Katipunan Avenue (fronting Miriam and Ateneo) in
Quezon City. For more inquiries please call 9293191 or
visit www.magnet.com. ph.

26-31 MARCH PROGRAM

March 26 (Monday)
Malaysian Mondays: East Asian and South East Asian
Program (Curated by Mervin Espina)
Amir Muhammad's
6shorts (+ 1)
LOST (2002, 9.5 min) | FRIDAY (2002, 8 min) | MONA
(2002, 6.5 min) | CHECKPOINT (2002, 7 min) | KAMUNTING
(2002, 15 min) | PANGYAU (2002, 12.5 min)
+ 18MP (2006, 14 min)

March 27 (Tuesday)
Sine Patriyotiko: MULA THIRD AVENUE HANGGANG DULO

A documentary on the lives of three members of a youth
gang, their angst and conflicts, their wars and
struggles, their damnation and eventual freedom. 1st
Place. Documentary Video Category, Gawad CCP Para Sa
Alternatibong Pelikula 2006

SIPAT [Sine Patriyotiko] is a non-profit media group
that organizes the production, distribution and
exhibition of independent audio-visual presentations.
“Sipat,” a Filipino term, means to look while aiming a
target. www.sipat.tk

March 28 (Wednesday)
Raya Martin and John Torres: SHORT FILMS

Shorts by Raya Martin:

BAKASYON [2004, 16mm, 12 mins]
A young girl from the city is left to the care of her
grandmother in the province. During her stay, the girl
learns about her grandmother’s mysterious identity.

LIFE PROJECTIONS [2006, DV, 4 mins]
“A video wants to be a film, as the world’s second
biggest oil spill just happened in the heart of the
filmmaker…A large group of Filipino film makers
responded with a short film to a disastrous oil spill
in their island nation. This talented film maker
instinctively avoided a political pamphlet and went
straight for the emotional core of the matter. He
found that core in his heart, as he writes himself.”
–Gertjan Zuillhof, International Film Festival
Rotterdam

LONG LIVE PHILIPPINE CINEMA! [2007, 16mm, 6 mins]
Mother Lily is a Filipino Chinese producer who
monopolizes the local film industry. And the only way
to keep Philippine Cinema alive is to kill her. “Yes,
a cinema to be proud of, yet the cheer is full of
irony. The history of Filipino film isn’t treated with
so much respect…. A burlesque, harsh satire about the
mistress of Philippine film production, the
Chinese-Filipino producer Mother Lily. She is hated
and feared, but nobody can get round her. Fortunately
this young film maker has thought up an adequate
solution to keep Philippine cinema alive. Mother Lily
is not a metaphorical invention. She really exists -
for now.” –Gertjan Zuillhof, International Film
Festival Rotterdam

Shorts by John Torres:

TAWIDGUTOM is an experimental love poem/monologue
composed of images that recur and repeat themselves.
The narrator reminisces on a relationship and
anticipates meeting his love again, both with
trepidation and excitement. SALAT is composed of
several vignettes that are like snap-shots of urban
life, juxtaposed once again with images of love,
friendship and everyday life. In THE LAST SHERBET,
street kids savour ice cream. LUNAR PLAY is a short
elegy for Portuguese footballer Miklos Feher
(1979-2004), while ELLIPSIS, KULOB, AND LUNAR PUNCH is
a triptych in which the narrator muses on hope and the
persistence of the spirit to want to carry on, against
the background of a relationship that has quietly
ended. KUNAP PAAANO KITA LILIGAWAN NANG DI KUMAKAPIT
SA IYO? is an experimental film composed of rapid
cuts, digitised images,snippets of urban and rural
landscapes that are placed against a running poem,
often premised by the film's title – how can I court
you without ever holding you? -- but this rhetorical
question is addressed as much to a lover unseen as it
is to inanimate objects and to the world around the
poet/narrator.

Also by John Torres:

Gabi Noong Sinabi ng Ama Ko (Night When Father Told
Me)
Father writes his confession. Son goes away and
buries his hero. He plays the flute for a
funeral/dance of beating drums, meets Chance and
achieves a rebirth of meaning and purpose. Son: "I
cannot put into words how much contempt and love I
feel for you right now."

March 29 (Thursday)
Southern Tagalog Exposure: PULANG SINE Program

March 30 (Friday)
eXtermination2 : Four Films by ELVERT de la Cruz
BAÑARES
• Ang Bayan Kong Payapa (4 min)
This is the state of the nation cycle. (Originally, a
2-channel video installation for an exhibit, the work
was re-edited for usual screening pleasures.)
• astrangiam
(7min) Mind over matter. Perception over fact. Life
over death. Shot in Casio Exilim EX-53 still camera,
'astrangiam' meditates on the relationships and
parallelisms of time, spontaneity, assumptions, dreams
and elements of nature.
• Gemini (8 min)
A diptych film – visual experimentation of 16mm found
footages, scratching, etching and punching holes on
the actual film – with each color of the film strips
soaked in different concoctions and buried in sand.
• Plema [Phlegm] (22 min)
Motivated by emotional turmoils and day-job related
exhaustion, the filmmaker creates this video letter to
his VIDPREP (Video Experimentation) class with hopes
to help exorcise personal demons. Recording on used
tapes and utilizing current illness, this
semi-autobiographic al video metaphorically structures
a visual collage of the filmmaker's wants, desires and
lamentations, strongly hinting of his retreat (or is
it escape?) from urban chaos and his complete
submission to creative freedom.
Plus
• Sukdulan Ng Pagrahuyo sa Dambana ng Sirenang Walang
Ulo
[The Zenith of Seduction at the Altar of the Headless
Mermaind] (12 min)
Poetry on video tackling themes of innocence, vices
and self-destruction. Shot in 1993 and re-constructed
in 2006. [Philippine Premiere]

Elvert de la Cruz Bañares is a filmmaker, curator,
educator and multi-media artist. His films have been
screened in underground film festivals in the United
States, Australia, Canada, Singapore and Japan. He
curated first time Filipino programs for the
'Queerfest: Vancouver Gay & Lesbian Film Festival' and
the 'Antimatter Underground Film & Video Festival' in
Victoria, Canada. He has, by far, written, produced
and directed 43 shorts (he calls them his "little
low-budget films"). "Gemini" is the only Filipino Film
in Official Selection at the Antimatter Underground
Film Festival 2004 in Canada and was presented as an
installation at the Daejon Museum of Art in South
Korea in 2005. Twice he was sent as Philippine
Delegate to Filipino film festivals in China
(Beijing'05 and Shanghai'06) . He is currently
finishing his two full-length films, 'Alipo-op Sa
Animo' (Fog In The Consciousness) and 'The Atomika
Settlement: Devastation Canvas # 5'. He is the
festival director of eKsperim[E]nto Festival of Film,
Video & New Media and the 2006 ASEAN Film Festival (at
The Podium).

March 31 (Saturday)
CAMPUS BASED FILMMAKERS: Works from the KALAYAAN
College Fine Arts Majors
and Multi Media Arts Department of the College of
Saint Benilde
Selected by Jay Ticar and Elvert Banares

Students from the Fine Arts Department of KALAYAAN
College present expressions on video. Shorn of
narrative, the works are visual plays and experiments
on form. CELINE ROQUE compares and contrasts visuals
on sex and religion on digital (experimental, 2007).
JAN LUDWIG GO presents INOM, a short experimental work
about the life of a student of the artist/filmmaker,
beginning when the subject decides to consume seven
bottles of beer ( 8 mins, digital, 2006). GABRIEL
ALDECOA, PAOLO MARTINEZ, and AYA CADIZ will also
present more experimental works.

About KALAYAAN College’s Bachelor of Fine Arts
program: The Department is guided by the philosophy
that every person can be nurtured to become an artist.
Although some may have special abilities concerning
art at a very early age, this does not mean that the
practice of art is limited to a few gifted
individuals. Through personal discipline, industry and
excellent training, the beginning student of fine arts
can be developed to become professional artists who
are at the same time responsive to the needs of their
communities.

The College of St. Benilde MultiMedia Arts Department
[Second Batch] presents the works ADAN by Gian Mawo,
SIPHAYO NG PINAKAMAGANDANG PANAGINIP by Rastle Lozano,
KULIGLIG by Jericho Añonuevo, KOSA by Karen Abarca,
DIWATA by Katz Delfin, WHISPERS by JM Qsuiblat, SILA
by Annie Beldia, and NGITI by Love Nakagawa.

About the CSB Bachelor of Arts in Multimedia Arts
(AB-MMA) program: This degree program is the first of
its kind in the country, it combines evolving areas
such as digital media and the Internet with core
skills such as communications, programming, and
graphic design. You harness the power of the latest
digital media technology. It is also recommended for
those who are interested in broadcasting, journalism,
communication arts, new media design and
communications, and other fields using digital
technologies.