Ryner Viray
Directing
Biography
Ryner Viray is a director, producer, editor, and production manager working across film, advertising, and digital media. A graduate of the University of the Philippines Film Institute, Ryner’s thesis short film Ang Luha ay Bahagi ng Karagatan (English: Tears are Part of the Ocean, 2025) examines mental health, psychosocial care, and generational trauma through a blend of transcendental cinema and psychological realism. The film has screened widely and received multiple honors and selections — Cannes World Film Festival 2025 — Winner, Best Narrative Short Film; IndieX Los Angeles International Short Film Festival 2025 — Award of Excellence (Special Jury Prize), Winner: Best Drama Short, with nominations for Best Male Director and Best Original Screenplay; Sinag Maynila Independent Film Festival 2025 — Official Selection (Student Narrative Shorts); Toronto Art Film Spirit Awards 2025 — Nominee, Best Student Film; 12th Bakunawa Fantastic Film Festival (Philippines) — Official Selection, Pinoy Phantasms Section; and Hollywood Short Film Festival 2025 — Honorable Mention. Ryner has edited both long- and short-form documentaries, commercials, and social-content campaigns, and produced UP Diliman’s 100 Years of Broadcasting commemorative programs for DZUP (2022). His professional practice spans post-production, production management, and creative development for independent and commercial projects. Driven by an interest in systems of control, healing, and identity within Filipino society, Ryner makes deeply personal, politically minded films that confront shame, longing, and survival amid economic and social hierarchies. He currently works freelance while developing his next narrative short and continuing to submit work to local and international festivals.
Known For
Between nuclear reactors and military curfews, 14-year-old Jani lives in a dystopian world oppressively devoid of empathy. Together, she and her slippery new friend Kiefer the talking catfish gear up to strike a surreal blow for freedom.
Catfish
Three strangers meet at a party one night and discover hidden desires, sins, and guilt when they realize that they are in the netherworld.
NO EXIT
Just as she was about to give up on her pursuit of companionship, traumatized, nine-year-old Sol meets and befriends a forest spirit on her tenth birthday, making way for an exploration of healing, identity, and desire in the remaining days before she enters a new school.
until then
In a mental rehabilitation center, a woman, newly turned sixty, with schizoaffective disorder, waits all year for her family to visit on her birthday. But as the day arrives, a typhoon threatens to derail her plans and her sense of reality.