Cris Bringas

The quiet life of the dreamer Ka Benjie was shattered when he heard of the enrollment in the other village.

In the summer of 2001, 16-year-old Andoy searches for his long-lost father in the most unlikely of things — VHS tapes. His reality becomes mystified when two movie-like characters appear in their small hometown.

Told through the tales of love of a retiring film projectionist and a late-blooming actress, the short documentary delves into the journey of Manila’s oldest movie theater from grandiosity to obsolescence.

The search for a burial token for her mother forces a woman to dig up a buried past and confront the house she abandoned for 11 years. As she descends, the house speaks to her.

Solitary men in a roomy but empty cinema, omnipresent smartphones, and pop-up sexual intimations coalesce in a raunchy yet incisive portrait of Manila's evolving queer space.