Cheer Factor: Pinoy indie wins Dutch grant

Indie filmmaker Khavn de la Cruz’s “Desaparadiso” is one of four grant recipients in the digital production section of the Hubert Bals Fund of the Rotterdam International Film Festival. De la Cruz is the only Filipino among this year’s grant recipients. The other filmmakers in De la Cruz’s section are from Argentina and Malaysia. De la Cruz’s planned film centers on activists who vanished during the martial-law years. “I want this film to be a reminder,” he said. “Martial rule may have ended, but people are still disappearing.”—Bayani San Diego Jr.