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4 Cinemalaya Awards

Brutus, the full length film directed by Tara Illenberger (my sister) and executive produced by Ronel Baylon (my husband) reaped 4 awards at the 2008 Cinemalaya Independent Film Festival. I feel myself puffing up with pride.  My gosh! My mother will be strutting like a peacock again. Yeheeeyy!  Yeheeey!

Here’s the list of awards: Jury Prize , Brutus by Tara Illenberger; Best Musical Score , Joey Ayala for Brutus; Best Supporting Actor , Yul Servo for Brutus; Best Cinematography ,  Jay Abello for Brutus.

For a film that almost never made it to its gala screening, getting four awards is not that bad. Not that bad at all. Just weeks before the film fest, a certain Non-Government Organization, upon the urging of a former American Peace Corps(who has no business meddling in Philippine affairs), threatened CCP with a Temporary Restraining Order. They didn’t want the film to be shown because of certain legal reasons that I cannot fully comprehend.  So my sister had to hire a lawyer to settle things  just a week before the opening of the festival. She said that she felt so tired and was ready to give up.  She told the Mangyans, whom she worked with and whose story she was telling, that she didn’t care about the festival anymore but if they wanted her to fight for the film then she would.  

I told my sister that her movie has a story that is worth telling. It is an honor that the Mangyan people have trusted her enough to allow her to tell the world of their plight. That thought should be enough to give her the  strength to fight for her film. It seemed that things got ironed out somehow and she was able to present her work to the public.

I haven’t seen it myself. I wish I could.   Still waiting to get a copy. In the meantime I just go to their website to find out what’s new.  If you’re curious you can click on this link: http://brutusthemovie.com/blog/?page_id=6