Filipino films are getting noticed in international film festivals abroad.
After Jun Robles Lana’s drama-comedy Die Beautiful won awards last year at the Metro Manila Film Festival and the Tokyo International Film Festival, it has now received two more nominations for the upcoming Asia Pacific Screen Awards (APSA), to be held in Brisbane, Australia later this month.
The film is nominated for the Cultural Diversity Award and its lead Paolo Ballesteros is nominated for Best Actor.
Another MMFF 2016 entry, the animated film Saving Sally, is also nominated at this year’s APSA under the Best Animated Feature Film category.
Birdshot, Mikhail Red’s film about a 14-year-old girl who shoots an endangered Philippine eagle, is also the only Southeast Asian film nominated for Best Asian Film in this year’s Australian Academy of Cinema and Television Arts, which will happen in Sydney in December.
Birdshot is also the Philippines’ official entry to Oscars 2018.
And the accolades don’t stop there.
Last week, it was reported that Filipino actors Allen Dizon and Angellie Sanoy won the special jury award at this year’s Warsaw International Film Festival held last Oct. 21 for their performance in the film Bomba (The Bomb).
The film, directed by Ralston Jover, tells the story of a deaf-mute man and his struggles living in Manila amidst the rising number of extrajudicial killings.
