PANAKOBA makes it to Nice Short Film Festival in Sydney Australia
After bagging the Best Feature Film and People’s Choice Award at the Annual De La Salle Indie Un-film Video Competition last March, iCOMM’s very own “Panakoba,” written and directed by Michael Canlas, has made it to the winter lineup of the Nice Shorts Film Festival, a Sydney-based organization that is considered the premiere short film festival in Asia Pacific
region.
The film is entered for competition but mere selection is good enough since public showing was arranged for a predominantly western audience. The film will be uploaded on their official website, (http://www.niceshorts.com.au)
Michael Allan Canlas graduated with a degree in Communication at the Colegio de San Juan de Letran in Manila, the oldest College in the Philippines.
As a junior, he shot and directed “Tagay” (Cheers), a documentary about the
Filipino drinking culture whose rights were immediately acquired by a local channel, ABC 5, to air on nationwide television.
On his senior year, he wrote and directed “Panakoba” (Child scarer), his first narrative short inspired by his own kids – Micah, 4 and Maureen, 1. The film crew includes: Diana Christian Colon – Director of Photography; Emyrose Nicolas – Assistant Director; Jan Vincent Chiu – Editor; Gian delos Santos, Jan Vincent Chiu – Sound Designers; Lorina Reyzcel Veloso – Production Designer; Eunice Evangelista – Costume and Makeup and Music by Abitto.
The film revolves around Ramwen, a specialist in scaring kids, who is known to be the best in the business. Everything goes
well until an Indian urban legend brings him back to his own childhood fears that will serve as his toughest challenge yet.
This is the first film that deals with the “Panakoba” or “Panakot Bata” — the Filipino version of the Boogeyman. A child rearing practice in the Philippines, kids are made to follow orders thru the use of imaginary characters. Given the prevalence of boogeyman tales across cultures, it may have an evolutionary origin as a mechanism for protecting young children from becoming vulnerable to predators by wandering away at night. Boogeyman may be said to target a specific mischief – for instance, a boogeyman that persecutes children who suck their thumbs – or just general misbehavior.
