Live stream preview

Watch this video and more on The Criterion Channel

Watch this video and more on The Criterion Channel

Start your free trial

Already subscribed? Sign in

When the Apocalypse Is Over: New Independent Philippine Cinema

The Gossips of Cicadidae

18m

Directed by Vahn Leinard Pascual • 2022 • Philippines
Starring Rolando Inocencio, AJ Benoza, Alleison Dimatulac

Drawing on silent-film aesthetics from a bygone era, this mesmerizing monochrome short tells a story of forbidden love. A young boy struggles with feeling trapped in his inherited role as his town’s next folk healer—until he meets a Tikbalang, the half-human, half-horse creature of Philippine folklore.

Up Next in When the Apocalypse Is Over: New Independent Philippine Cinema

  • the river that never ends
    19:02
    the river that never ends

    the river that never ends

    Directed by JT Trinidad • 2022 • Philippines
    Starring Emerald Romero, Hesus Deligero, Ron Go

    Along a river undergoing major development, Baby, a middle-aged trans woman, shuttles between her job as a companion-for-hire for strangers and her duty to her father. As the people around Baby start to ...

  • Rocks in a Windless Wadi
    22:57
    Rocks in a Windless Wadi

    Rocks in a Windless Wadi

    Directed by EJ Gagui • 2022 • Philippines

    Three men describe their long-buried childhood traumas as mysterious, ghostly images shot around a wadi flicker before our eyes.

  • Hito
    21:56
    Hito

    Hito

    Directed by Stephen Lopez • 2023 • Philippines
    Starring Kyrie Allison Samodio, Jun Jun Quintana, Bor Ocampo

    Between nuclear reactors and military curfews, fourteen-year-old Jani lives in a dystopian world oppressively devoid of empathy. Together, she and her slippery new friend Kiefer the talkin...

×