
Carl Joseph E. Papa
Directing
Biography
Carl Joseph Papa is a Filipino filmmaker and animator. A well-known figure of Philippine animation, his filmography employed rotoscoping animated features which are most often use of subject matters in the daily life of the Philippines, particularly with the themes of family struggles. His films have been screened at film festivals worldwide and received multiple accolades during his lifetime including black tragicomedy Manang Biring (2015) and musical comedy-drama Paglisan (2018), both of them which won him Best Film twice at Cinema One Originals Film Festival, and psychological drama science-fiction Iti Mapukpukaw (2023), won the Best Film at the 19th Cinemalaya Independent Film Festival. In 2025, he won Best Short Film for The Next 24 Hours at the 21st Cinemalaya Independent Film Festival.
Known For

Fifteen years after the Maguindanao Massacre, the family of its 58th victim fights for the justice that remains elusive.
58th

Two hours after the apocalypse started in the Philippines, a silly Filipino stray rescue dog is dead set on finding her student owner through a long dangerous journey to defeat her worst enemy: an empty food bowl.
Runo!

When an alien comes back to take him, a mouthless young man's life twists and turns as his memories untangle.
The Missing

Having the ability of energy absorption & redirection, Mang Jose covertly saves people only if they rent him out. One day, carefree young man TOPE rents Mang Jose to help him save his mother who has been abducted by mysterious troopers of KING INA, an enigmatic cunning villainess who is out there to annihilate all remaining superheroes in hiding.
Mang Jose

Crisanto and Dolores’ marriage is going through a rough patch. Going through a marital crisis, a couple’s marriage is tested when Crisanto is diagnosed with early-onset Alzheimer’s disease as Dolores sinks deeper into depression. Paglisan tells the story of how a married couple attempt to survive together through fading memories and fleeting identities.
Paglisan

A young filmmaker is bent on recreating forgotten massacres from Philippine history, but when she begins shooting at a site where 1,000 men, women, and children were slaughtered, angry spirits are awakened and the lives of her team and the local villagers are put in peril.
Cinemartyrs

ASUANG, the God of Sins, was once a ruthless and fickle God of Bicol, but now he is a loner and a loser who has no place in the world that is overrun by sinful human beings. He resorted to social media to regain his former glory and fame but to no avail. On his track to retirement, he was approached by the Seers to help them stop Armageddon. Along with a group of sinful misfits, Asuang will go on a quest, against his nature, to help mankind… Or so he thinks he will.
Asuang

Manang Biring is a feisty but terminally-ill old lady who has learned to accept her imminent demise. Until one day, she receives a letter from her long-estranged daughter abroad announcing of her return for the holidays.
Manang Biring

Inspired by true events, a gifted yet rebellious high school student transfers from a prestigious academy to a notorious "cursed section" in a public school. There, he befriends a group of misfits known as "The Boys at the Back" and embarks on a mission to help them graduate, showcasing the transformative power of unity and friendship.
Boys at the Back
A young woman grasps at the memories her mother left - leading to a vicious cycle of remembering, of forgetting, of mourning. This is a story of a daughter's grief and her struggle to preserve happy memories and un-remember painful ones.
The Unforgetting
A young robot meets a lost, distressed child who disrupts his daily routine. Little did he know that this child will introduce him to an absence in his life that he will desperately try to fill.
Mother

In a busy pub in Quezon City, a grieving old man and a lively old woman learn that two halves make one whole.
Love Bites

After a sexual assault, a young woman navigates a cold and bureaucratic system over the course of 24 hours, fighting to reclaim her safety and sanity while battling the manipulations of her assailant.
The Next 24 Hours
2026 Puregold CinePanalo Film Festival finalist
Dead Hungry
Five interconnected lives of a transferee, his classmate, the editor-in-chief, an upperclassman, and the principal grapple with their own fears and loyalties as a student newspaper article threatens to dismantle a school's bedrock of dark secrets.