Cinemalaya films win in Brazil, Spain

Jona Ballaran won best costume design in Madrid.

Two Filipino films bagged trophies in festivals held in Brazil and Spain recently.

Carlo Francisco Manatad’s “Fatima Marie Torres and the Invasion of the Space Shuttle Pinas 25” scored two awards at the recently concluded Mostra Internacional de Cinema de São Luis, held last July 18 in Brazil.

“Fatima” won best short film and best cinematography for Chesca Espiritu in São Luis. For its maiden edition, the festival presented an “international panorama of contemporary cinema.”

The São Luis fest also aims to “promote the preservation of great classics” that were shown on the big screen—“an irreplaceable audio-visual experience.” The event gathered films and filmmakers who had earlier made waves in Cannes, Venice and Toronto.

Manatad’s “Jodilerks dela Cruz, Employee of the Month” premiered at the International Critics’ Week section of Cannes last May.
“Fatima,” which previously won best comedy film in the Aspen Shortsfest, is an entry in the short film competition of this year’s Cinemalaya fest.

Espiritu told the Inquirer: “This is my first-ever win as a cinematographer. Shooting the short film with good friends was a great experience in itself, and being recognized internationally for it is such a big, happy bonus.”

Meanwhile, an entry in the full-length feature section of last year’s Cinemalaya won at the Madrid International Film Festival held on July 15 in Spain.

Jona Ballaran clinched the best costume design trophy for Atom Magadia’s period love story, “Dagsin (Gravity).”
“I was the only Filipino to win in Madrid this year,” Ballaran told the Inquirer.

She said she was “grateful and honored” to be chosen by the Madrid jury. “It was like winning the Lotto,” she quipped. “I went to Spain without any expectation at all.”

She confessed that her “only desire was to maximize the opportunity by meeting with fellow designers and filmmakers, and learning from them.”

“That was why the award came as a total surprise to me,” she owned up.
She dedicates the honor to fellow Filipinos.

“I am proud to bring home this trophy to my countrymen,” she asserted. “This is my first time to be nominated. In local award-giving bodies, costume design doesn’t have its own category; it’s usually a part of production design. Hopefully, this is the start!”