BY RAYNALD C RIVERA
Two weeks ahead of the opening of the fourth Doha Tribeca Film Festival (DTFF), the festival fever permeates across the country with posters advertising the upcoming annual event dotting the city streets hailing everyone to ‘Be Part of the Story’.
In what promises to be a longer and bigger festival with three more days added and 30 more films to be screened compared to last year, this year’s festival is even made special as locally made films take the spotlight in the Made in Qatar section launched last year.
In just a short span of time Made in Qatar has seen meteoric rise with 19 contenders for the award picked out from 70 submissions. While most of the nominees are short films, three of them are feature films. The Made in Qatar category is seen an effective way to nurture Qatar-based talents and at the same time bring the festival closer to the people of Qatar and one film that does just that is ‘Angel in June’, one of the three feature films, by young Filipino filmmaker Jan Xavier Pacle.
Entirely shot in Qatar, ‘Angel in June’ takes pride as the first film about Overseas Filipino Workers (OFWs) in Qatar made by OFWs themselves, most of whom were new to filmmaking.
“This film does not only tell about the Filipino community here but was made by them as well. Around 97 percent of the cast and crew were first timers in filmmaking,” relates Pacle.
It was heartwarming how the entire Filipino community had become united lending a hand to make the film possible, from students to accountants to CCTV technicians to seamstresses.
“The boom mic operator was actually a backhoe operator, the grips were physiotherapists…They all volunteered not only for experience but because they all have the heart for film.”
It was only Pacle, the gaffer and veteran actor-filmmaker Leo Martinez who had previous experience in filmmaking. Martinez had spent four decades in Philippine television and movies both as an actor and director and currently heads the Film Academy of the Philippines.
Manila-based Martinez who had such belief in the project flew to Qatar to get involved in the film providing invaluable input and sharing his acting talent as well.
“I met Leo Martinez through one of our producers Divina Cuasay. He executive produced the film and as a veteran in the film industry, he taught the whole cast and crew about filmmaking, even conducting private workshops for the cast. Until now, he’s helping in the release of the film in the Philippines.”
‘Angel in June’ traces the true story of a young charitable girl whose family was devastated by her untimely demise due to leukemia. Angel, whose parents were both working in Qatar, was an achiever studying in Doha when she died of leukemia in 2007 at the age of 13, just days after having been diagnosed with the deadly disease.
The story was originally planned to be made into a short film, “but having heard the story from Angel’s real parents, I thought that a short film would not do justice to Angel’s life story. So we started producing it as a feature early this year.”
The director admits he was very much inspired by the story of the young girl, “who she was and what she had done.”
“Her idea of charity and generosity was just way beyond her years. In fact, we had to cut some parts of the film because they seemed too unrealistic even though they really happened in real life.”
Joyce Sison, a student of Philippine School Doha who plays Angel in the film, was once Angel’s schoolmate. The film also stars Israel Gonzales Malabanan, Stacey Ann Canicosa, Sarakiel Tandingan, Pilar Grace Cruz-Malabanan, David Drew Ayson and Leo Martinez.
The film was also created in an effort to raise cancer awareness in Doha and beyond, according to the director who is no newcomer to festivals having joined DTFF for the second time and whose film ‘Finding Faith’ was screened at the Cannes International Film Festival.
“Being selected for the DTFF the second time is a real honour for me. I think it greatly boosts my confidence as well in my film career as it proves that my skills are moving forward,” said Pacle whose film ‘I Love You Ma’am’ was nominated at last year’s DTFF Made in Qatar section.
On what sets Angel of June apart from other nominees in the category, he said: “I haven’t seen most of the other contenders yet, but based on their synopses, I think what makes this film unique is its genre. It doesn’t deal with social nor political issues rather this film shows the trials of a real family and the journey of their child as she tries to shine amidst a sea of faces.”
Having been entirely shot in Qatar, the film is expected to connect well to the Doha audience as it projects on big screen breathtaking locales commonplace to people living here but extraordinary to those unfamiliar with the country’s booming landscape.
“We have filmed both in the city and the desert. Let’s just say if you don’t know Qatar well enough, you wouldn’t think it was shot in Qatar.”
Originally the plan was to create a film specifically for the DTFF, said Pacle, but with the excellent quality of the film, the producers now want to go further eyeing cinemas both in Qatar and the Philippines to share the story to a wider audience.
The Peninsula
