Director Brillante Mendoza's film on reality of living conditions in Manila competes in Cannes

Record ID: 102977

  • Title: Director Brillante Mendoza's film on reality of living conditions in Manila competes in Cannes
  • Date: 19th May 2016
  • Summary: CANNES, FRANCE (MAY 19, 2016) (REUTERS) VARIOUS OF MENDOZA GIVING INTERVIEW (SOUNDBITE) (English) DIRECTOR, BRILLANTE MENDOZA, SAYING: "This situation is really happening back in the Philippines and it's quite alarming because it comes to a way of life, this drugs dealing, like they sell drugs in their own home, the small time drug selling and all that is happening and it's quite alarming and something needs to be done. That's why I decided to make a story out of this situation."
  • Embargoed: 3rd June 2016 21:07
  • Keywords: Cannes Film Festival Brillante Mendoza Manilla
  • Location: CANNES, FRANCE AND UNKNOWN FILMING LOCATIONS
  • City: CANNES, FRANCE AND UNKNOWN FILMING LOCATIONS
  • Country: France
  • Topics: Film
  • Reuters ID: LVA0024IH2D71
  • Aspect Ratio: 16:9
  • Story Text: Prolific director Brillante Mendoza's latest offering to the world's biggest film festival brings the difficult living conditions of a poor Manila family to the glamourous French seaside resort.
    'Ma' Rosa', which premiered at the Cannes Film Festival on Wednesday (May 18), tells the story of Rosa Reyes, a woman who owns a convenience store in a poor neighbourhood of Manila, making ends meet with her husband Nestor by selling a bit of drugs.
    Both are detained at a police station after their home is raided and it leaves their three children in the Manila wildness looking to find money to pay off the corrupt police officers to free their parents.
    "This situation is really happening back in the Philippines and it's quite alarming because it comes to a way of life, this drugs dealing, like they sell drugs in their own home, the small time drug selling and all that is happening and it's quite alarming and something needs to be done. That's why I decided to make a story out of this situation," Mendoza told Reuters Television on Thursday (May 19).
    Mendoza, however, believes Philippines is not the only country plagued by corruption.
    "It is happening, it is ugly, it's not right, you know, but then again it's true, it's real and you know, in my craft and in my art and in my story telling I have to be truthful about it, I have to be honest about it, it's a painful truth, you know, and we need to recognise that but then at the same time we also have to realise that this is not only happening in my country, I mean if we just go out of our shelter, you know, there is a lot of bigger corruption that is happening all over the world maybe on a different scale," he said.
    Mendoza, who had won the Best Director award in Cannes in 2009 for 'Kinatay', said that showing a film in the main competition would help get the world to think about the topics of the film.
    "I think Cannes is one of the best venue if not the right venue for these kind of films because this is where the whole world, you know, watch films from different walks of life and from different parts of the world, they watch films and want to know more about, not only about cinema but about the culture. About the people around the rest of the world so I think that it is also a wake up call to the rest of us in the audience and also to the people back in their own county wherever the filmmakers are coming from because this is a reminder that this thing is happening, so, this is what is happening right now in the world," he said.
    'Ma' Rosa' is among the twenty-one films competing for the Palme d'Or, which will be awarded on Sunday.
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