A homegrown cinema in the Philippines that best exemplifies a cinema from the regions is the cinema that has emerged out of Davao de Oro.
Before the construction of its Cinematheque, films made by its own community of filmmakers were screened in an open-air cinema at the municipal plaza of Nabunturan through the annual Nabunturan Independent Film Exhibition or NABIFILMEX.
NABIFILMEX celebrated its 10th anniversary in September this year with a growing selection of films not just from their locality but also from other regions in the Philippines. This year’s top prize went to an Ilocano film called Karkarma (Soul) by Melver Ritz Gomez. This year, the Sine Indie, NABIFILMEX’s film workshop component, focused on producing documentary works from the participants.
In celebration of its 10th year, I revisited some of the celebrated short films that have emerged from Davao de Oro, which have been screened in various film festivals across the Philippines, including the annual Cinema Rehiyon. From Bryan Jimenez’s Pasuon made in 2014 to last year’s Naboc by Rodel Jr. Artiaga,
NABIFILMEX continues to showcase cinematic visions that magnify social realities in a landlocked province sitting on a goldmine but whose people are left at the margins.
The video presented here, This Land is Mined, discusses in detail the plot points in the short films.
This Land is Mined was completed under the Arts Equator Fellowship. The author is the lone Filipino among five Southeast Asians who were awarded the fellowship.
The author hopes that through this Fellowship, he can “encourage more writers from the regions to write about their own cinemas and to be more engaged in their filmmaking communities— seeking, questioning, being part of its evolution.”
You may view Pasuon and Tami-aw on a popular free video streaming site.