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Some Belated Response to Grant’s “LA 2019”
Considered as one of the fundamental texts in the British Accelerationist strand is Iain Hamilton Grant’s 1996 essay “LA 2019: Demopathy and Xenogenesis. Some Realist Notes on Bladerunner and the Postmodern Condition” to which his very idea of the “postmodern” was lifted directly and almost uncritically from the writings of the French Philosopher, Jean-Francois Lyotard.…
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Breaking the Glass Air
There is no salvation in the saying of words –But what weapon do we useagainst that which oppresses & chokes?Silence overwhelmsbut we must keep on inventing the wordthat will smashthe thick glass of air between us.Edel Garcellano, “Words” There is no need to fear or hope, but only to look for new weapons.Gilles Deleuze, “Postscript…
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On Cinema and Parapolitics
If there’s anything that the cancellation of the GMA Public Affairs’ Lost Sabungeros Cinemalaya premiere reveals to us, it is the nature of the Philippine parapolitics. If you have been following the writer-peasant rights advocate Jayvene Timblique in his socials, particularly in his twitter, you will recognize where we intersect in this topic. Jayvene introduced…
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On CCP’s Gawad Alternatibo
Almost a year ago, I was invited by my friend, Adrian Mendizabal, who was overseeing that year’s Gawad Alternatibo congress, to sit in one of the panels for Film Criticism with three other participants to say something about the “Role of Local Film Criticism and Cinephilia in the Critical Reception of Gawad Alternatibo and in…
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Casting Doubt to a Barber’s Tale
I tweeted some days ago: “Weird how the perception towards Philip Salvador and his collaborations with Brocka shifted with his support for the Duterte Admin but never Nora Aunor whose support for the Marcoses has been unwavering since the 1970s.” This was just some off-the-butt thing, nothing to follow through. A sigh of frustration, perhaps. …
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In Memoriam: Noli Manaig
screencap from Noli Manaig’s Michel de Certau’s Metaphors for Everyday Life Noli Manaig, poet, critic, and filmmaker, died last year at around November due to cancer, as narrated by his cousin, Nel, in an unusual update from their collective blog, the persistence of vision. I would not have found the news if I did not…
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When imperialist lapdogs bark: a response to Isagani de Castro’s “Is there a New Filipino Cinema Audience”?
This post is made in response to a question raised by a student of mine in class about an article written by a certain Isagani de Castro, Jr for Rappler titled “Is there a new Filipino Cinema audience?”[1] It’s within the similar vein of journalistic endeavor in film writing that Jason Tan Liwag’s article that…
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Double Feature: QCinema and Sitio San Roque
For years since my first involvement with SIKAD, a cultural organization advocating for the rights of the Urban Poor, the Quezon City government never failed to make two significant events happen at the same time: the QCinema International Film Festival and waves of violent housing demolition against the residents of Sitio San Roque located in…
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Need Space?
a response to Jason Tan Liwag’s op-ed, “Is there still space for the Filipino film critic?”
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Commentary on Jose Maria Sison’s “The Need for a Cultural Revolution” (Part 2)
Part 1 here Just as revolution is inevitable in politico-economic relations, revolution is inevitable in culture. A cultural revolution, as a matter of fact, is a necessary aspect of the politico-economic revolution. In the history of mankind, it can easily be seen that even before the full development of the politico-economic power of an ascendant…