‘Manila’ is opening film of 2009 Cinemalaya film Festival
“Manila” directed by prize-winning directors Adolf B. Alix Jr. and Raya Martin, will open the 2009 Cinemalaya Independent Film Festival and Competition on July 17, 7:30 p.m. at the Cultural Center of the Philippines Tanghalang Nicanor Abelardo (Main Theater). This will be the film’s Philippine premiere after it’s successful screenings in the 62nd Festival de Cannes and the 31st Moscow International Film Festival. Piolo Pascual co-produced and stars in this film which pays tribute to great Filipino directors Lino Brocka and Ishmael Bernal. The film features Pascual in two different roles. In the first episode, he plays William, a drug addict, who tries to reconnect his ties with people close to him – a fair-weathered girlfriend, an unforgiving mother who has a secret past, and a comatosed matron lover he wants nothing to do with. Slowly, as night falls, he learns that there is no one left to trust, not evenb his own self, in the second part, he essays the role of Philip who works as a b...