Manoro

Manoro

The Teacher

Directed by Brillante Mendoza

Philippines, 2006

Cornerhouse, 19 November 2011

An important portrait of the marginalised and the dispossessed in the Philippines.

There are two engines to the film.  The main one is a forthcoming Philippine election and the efforts of a young woman to enable people in her Aeta community – her family and friends – to vote.  She’s a literacy teacher; the people in her community are unaccustomed to reading and writing.  Her grandfather is a hunter and he is after a wild boar; and this provides the second engine of the film.

In a sense, what we have are two forms of empowerment, one recent or emerging (the right to vote, literacy) and one traditional but waning (for hunting as a way of life seems to be on its way out) and Brillante Mendoza has captured a moment in time when both are crucial, both important.

Manoro was shown as part of the Asia Triennial Manchester 11 Film Programme.  Forthcoming films can be seen here.

Service

Service

Directed by Brillante Mendoza

Philippines, 2008

Cornerhouse, 8 October 2011

This fecund film teems at the seams, jam-packed with life and incident.

It vibes earthy but could only have been set in a city.  A building houses a porn cinema which doubles as a rendezvous for gay patrons and the young men who service them.  The cinema and the large, extended Phillippine family who own and run it somehow manage to coexist side by side.  Adventures of various kinds are captured by Brillante Mendoza’s ubiquitous camera, a creature hungry to live, eager to register experience.  Most action takes place in and around the building: a jeopardy-strewn island in the city, a perilous oasis.

Service is a very interesting film, similar in style to the work of Robert Altman.  Many and various characters, no single narrative strand.  It is one of several Brillante Mendoza films showing as part of Asia Triennial Manchester 11, the full film programme of which can be seen here.

Made in India by Shisha

Made in India
Indian Short Creative Videoworks
Shisha
MadLab, 4 November 2010

This was a selection of videos to showcase the Asia Triennial Manchester, which will take place during October and November 2011.

Two works in particular stood out for me. 

‘It’s a human relations thing’ by Alana Victoria Hunt was hilarious and it will strike a chord with anyone who’s ever shared a house with anti-social (unsanitary, stupid, feral…) neighbours.  Invigorating invective.

By contrast, Parthiv Shah’s ‘Barbed wires and beautiful skies: Looking at Kashmir in frames’, while transporting, was quite sombre in places.  Among the images presented were a border crossing, armed Indian soldiers, a view of a Mosque seen through barbed wire, derelict buildings.  Yet also a field of flowers of many colours.  Kashmir is a beautiful land whose misfortune is its strategic importance, so-called.

The exhibition has only a short run and closes today at 5pm.  Details here.