Joselito Altarejos’ LGBT drama, “Tale of the Lost Boys” won four awards including Best Picture to lead all winners in the 4th Sinag Maynila film festival awards night held Sunday at the Forbes Ballroom of Conrad Manila hotel in Pasay City.
Altarejos’ film also won Best Screenplay for May delos Santos, Best Editing for Diego Marx Robles and the festival Box Office award.
In an emotionally revealing speech, Altarejos recalled that the last time he won an award at Sinag Maynila was in 2016 when he took home the Best Screenplay trophy for his film, “T.O.P.”
“The last time I was here in Sinag Maynila, I was in the middle of mania. I’m bipolar,” Altarejos admitted as he went on to say that he was undergoing therapy and taking medication while he was filming “Tale of the Lost Boys” in Taiwan last year.
“This is really special to me…It means that you can be a responsible and creative person even though you are going through a mental condition,” he pointed out.
Another big winner in the festival is Ralston Jover’s “Bomba,” about a May-December affair between a middle-aged deaf mute man and a teenager in an urban poor area set against the backdrop of extrajudicial killings. The film won a total of four awards with Jover winning Best Director while Pipo Domagas clinching Best Cinematography.
Lead stars Allen Dizon and Angeli Nicole Sanoy won Best Actor and Best Actress respectively. This is Dizon’s second Sinag Maynila Best Actor trophy following his 2015 win for Lawrence Fajardo’s “Imbisibol.”
Richard Somes’ “El Peste” won the SM People’s Choice award while also taking home Best Production Design for the director’s students or as formally known, the Richard V. Somes Production Design Workshop, Batch 1.
Matthew Victor Pastor’s “Melodrama/Random/Melbourne” won Best Musical Score for Fergus Cronkite while Yam Laranas’ “Abomination” won Best Sound for Mikko Quizon.
In other categories, Odin B. Fernandez’s “The Duwende” won Best Short Film, Janine Santos won Best Documentary Film for “Mahal, 2017” while “Journeyman Finds Home: The Simone Rota Story” by Albert Almendralejo and Maricel Cariaga won the Special Jury Prize for Documentary film.
A joint project of Solar Entertainment, Centerstage Productions and SM Cinema in partnership with the Film Development Council of the Philippines and CineLokal, the Sinag Maynila film festival will run until March 15 at SM cinemas in SM Mall of Asia, SM City North EDSA, SM City Fairview, SM Southmall, SM City Bacoor, SM City Manila and SM Sta. Mesa.