Fear Something New With This Judy Ann Santos, Lorna Tolentino and Chanda Romero Starrer ESPANTAHO

When we heard Judy Ann Santos-Agoncillo was participating in this year's Metro Manila Film Festival, we were really excited about particular film she's doing; they call it "ESPANTAHO". The term actually means a "scarecrow", a thing that's pretty common in farmlands, especially in agricultural countries like ours.

It's been a while since she's done something like this, but it was promised to her by Director Chito Roño who called her for the project. Judy Ann says "It's been a while since I've worked with Direk Chito Roño. Before I was a young lady, but now I already have a daughter. I'm happy because when he called me for a horror film, I didn't say anything, just "let's do it!". This is a dream, I wanted to experience it, he's calmer now, but still has a mic when he does sarcastic lines. I'm not the one he's getting mad at these days, but when you do it with him, it is fulfilling!"

This film was prepped for a year before they got to make the script. When the writer Christ Martinez presented it, he got "good" feedback from Direk Chito, and things started rolling from that. Atty Joji remarks how this has been a collaborative experience for them, and since Direk Chito is a master Director, they wanted to make a great film with them during their 20th Anniversary. The only issues they encountered were mostly because of the weather, but they adjusted with the season to fit the story. 

JC Santos likened Direk Chito to his former theater mentors, because once he asks for one more shot, it means you would need to do better on the scene. If he says "next scene", that means you're good. Most of them nodded in agreement, and Direk Chito felt he was getting roasted during the press conference (they had a laugh about it). 

Here's the press conference on video, of course! I got you!

They let us in on a secret, that painting on the left side of the stage will play a significant part in the film so if you see this in any theaters they'll be showing ESPANTAHO, go take a photo with it!

Ms. Lorna Tolentino took time to talk about love, family and a few more things about the movie after the press conference, listen in to the conversation:

In a nutshell, you would need to watch this film because of the caliber of actors that are in it. Not to mention how big of a horror director Chito Roño is, and how he's come to embrace new technology, special effects, and face a new crowd of movie goers eager to see something new, as you introduce a brand new entity to fear because they don't know what lurks behind that painting that you base the story on.

Hope this forms a cult following, perhaps a sequel too! The film will show on December 25 together with other MMFF 2024 entries, but consider watching this first especially if you're a Judy Ann Santos Agoncillo fan. This is produced by Cineko Productions, Purple Bunny Productions and Quantum Films. They promise that this will be the scariest film you're about to see on MMFF 2024.

Watch Chito Roño’s Signal Rock

Watching this R18 film Signal Rock on Pista ng Pelikula season was nice, it felt good. It’s a bit dragging on some parts but essential to build up certain highlights of the film. It’s sad, but has some funny parts, implicating real life.

The premise is real, some parts of the country have no signal, especially the islands (we have 7,107 islands anyway). Christian Bables plays a young lad from the province, who just like people you and I know have relatives who work overseas. Custom sometimes dictates they (in his case his sister) need to send money back home so they too could live comfortably, or at least survive in a place with measly income, mostly no work, but the plot is, they can only call and talk to her in one place, that thing they call Signal Rock. Bables who plays Intoy only uses an old 5110 phone with an antenna that has a fork latched to it.

Intoy lives in a small community, where everyone knows everyone. The place wreaks of an old school provincial setup, like dancing in the plaza, usual brawls. Somewhere there’s a love story there too. His sister gets in trouble, domestic violence, can’t even go home or get help either. Poor as a rat he’s as helpless to even ask for help, and even he knows all the women in his island only go work in far places so they could trip on some old joe and get married to get out of poverty. Conflict then starts when he’s set to prove their financial ability to take care of the kid and his sister.

I don’t want to spoil things for you but this talks about what happens to Filipinos and if their lives caught up in a cycle of poverty, how they think of ways to get out of it. It also talks of the struggles keeping relationships, the ones that break, plus the ones that still feels human. It’s a treat to see an easy film during PPP, in a way this does that.

Please note of the performance of Joel Saracho, he should get a supporting role award.

This is Chito Roño’s film, distributed by Regal Films. I applaud Christian Bables’ portrayal, but is this enough to get him a best actor role? You must find out for yourself and watch this during Pista ng Pelikulang Pilipino slated August 15 - 22, 2018. Everything must have a good ending, this has got one, I guess.

There is a lack of superstar artists in this film but the cast surely made up for it.

Direk Chito Roño said after the screening “I hope our little sacrifice would at least make you willing to spread the word about our film, after the movies I had in the past, I now learned to distribute the movie well now especially with Regal. Thank you for the help Roselle Monteverde.”

Christian Bables also went in front after the screening and said “I hope you help us with this film, you have seen how much hardships we have had in making this film. I hope you ask your relatives in the province to ask for this be shown in movie theatres even after the festival. Thank you!”

There must be a subliminal message here, they must have been sponsored by Nokia, watch the movie and see why.

KUMAGCOW

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