Filmmaker Lin Jianjie’s uneasy piece depicts a sombre modern China moving from its one-child policy to embracing its now two-child and more policy. It dwells on sibling rivalry between two sons, one biological and the other adopted.

After the success of Ray Yeung’s last Hong Kong-based mature-age gay-themed film TWILIGHT’S KISS (or SUK SUK), together with previous Western-based gay Chinese love story films CUT SLEEVE BOYS and FRONT COVER, this auteur writer-director has ventured queer territory again with his Berlinale Teddy award-winner ALL SHALL BE WELL.

Director Takashi Shimizu, known for his previous Japanese horror works such as the pioneering THE GRUDGE, JU-ON and MAREBITO, now delivers a combination of monstrosity tied this time with virtual reality. Set on a remote Japanese island, IMMERSION employs the same ghastly storyline of the dead reimmersing back to life to attack the living.

In the enigmatic introspection of Kei Ishikawa’s A MAN, the boundaries of identity blur with the essence of truth, subjecting itself to endless scrutiny. Adapted from Keiichiro Hirano’s novel, Ishikawa artfully delves deep into self-discovery that challenges our perceptions of ourselves and others.

It is a combined understated yet over-the-top performance from an unassuming role of a cruise yacht “toilet manager” Abigail turned authoritative cougar captain on a desert island. Still, Dolly de Leon meets these acting challenges and delivers an unforgettable cinematic performance in Ruben Östlund’s dark Swedish social satire TRIANGLE OF SADNESS. The 2022 Cannes Palme d’Or winner is a re-examination of class struggle and social manners and is broken into three parts, with the best shock saved for last.

Not much is known about famed Russian composer Pyotr Ilyich Tchaikovsky’s wife, Antonina Miliukova. Wikipedia summarises her in Tchaikovsky’s biography with just a few statements, stating that their marriage in 1877 was “a disaster” and they were “mismatched psychologically and sexually” and only lived together for six weeks before Tchaikovsky left her, as he was emotionally agitated and suffered “from acute writer’s block.” Their separation forced Tchaikovsky to confront the truth about his sexuality with the support of his family. Ultimately, he “never blamed Antonina for the failure of their marriage.”

The film adaptation of the 2016 stage musical KATIPS, written and directed by filmmaker and lawyer Vincent Tañada, is both earnest and eye-opening. The film already has many achievements. It has earned 17 nominations at the 70th Filipino Academy of Movie Arts and Sciences (FAMAS) Awards and won seven categories for Best Picture, Best Director and Best Actor for Tañada, Best Supporting Actor for Johnrey Rivas, Best Cinematography, Best Original Song for Sa Gitna Ng Gulo, and Pipo Cifra for Best Musical Score.

If the film MAID IN MALACAÑANG were an art form, it would definitely be expressionist in nature, where the concept of reality is slanted so the artist can convey their own interpretations. The reality in director Darryl Yap’s mind is not without artificiality, nor is it faithful to mirroring the truth, and the filmmaker would rather capture these fragmented accounts of events and transform them into palatable moments of marketable melodrama.

In Karl Malakunas’s DELIKADO, the Philippines is portrayed as an environmental paradise under a looming threat of destruction from within. The setting is the island of Palawan, the last remaining frontier of untouched, pristine nature of land and sea in the archipelago’s numerous islands, threatened by heavy illegal logging and unlawful fishing. The film’s three main protagonists are the activist defenders of the country’s natural habitat, but they are just the mighty small Davids to strong mammoth Goliaths who have an edge with power and money, which are the essential armours to rule in this exquisite but divisive nation.

How young should you be to learn philosophy? I know I didn’t have it as a subject until my third year of college.

There are many lessons learned in Lauren Greenfield’s illuminating documentary on Imelda Marcos. It is probably the most piercingly truthful, critically revealing, all-encompassingly no-holds-barred account of Imelda Marcos and her family. It covers her glory years as First Lady of the Philippines to her eventual downfall up to the current era with her son Senator Bong Bong Marcos recently running and losing the 2016 vice-presidency race.

Nope, this is not a Magnolia ice cream flavour of the month. UNBREAKABLE is an epic-length Filipino-style melodrama about female bonding and friendship as it stands the test of time. The plotline is engulfed in tragedies and plot twists that encapture you as an audience despite the uneven subtlety at some points of the story. Nevertheless, there are enough dramatic moments and conflicts peppered throughout the film to keep you involved through its climactic end.