SELECTED short films focusing on environment and climate change will be screened in EuroPelikula, one of Allied Festival partners of Cinemalaya, now ongoing in the Cinemalaya Philippine Independent Film Festival until Aug. 16.

The films are offered for free on the Vimeo platform.

A film festival presented by the European Union, EuroPelikula is screening A Sunny Day by Moroccan director Faouzi Bensaïdi, Hungry Seagull by Chinese director Leon Wang, Olmo by Italian director Silvio Soldini, Tuã Ingugu by Brazilian director Daniela Thomas, Kokota: The Islet of Hope by Craig Norris, Qurut by Shahrbanoo Sadat, In One Drag by Alireza Hashempour, and Tant de Forets by Burku Sankur and Geoffrey Godet.

A Sunny Day is a short film on how men and women survive under the impact of a changing climate, in a distant and near future, both fantastic and absurd. Hungry Seagull focuses on the lives of a family of seagulls living on an island not far from the mainland, and how they survive amidst the threat of offshore overfishing and the pollution of the marine environment.

Olmo is about an 80-year-old grandfather, and his grandson Giulio who read an article from a newspaper about melting glaciers, the greenhouse effect, methane and CO2.  Instead of going to school, the two go on an adventure looking for an old tree. Tuã Ingugu captures the relationship between the Xingu community and their river, and the emotions of one of them when he is taken to see Sao Paulo rivers.

Kokota: The Islet of Hope tells about a man who visits a tiny neighboring islet called Kokota, and tries to help after seeing the island teeter towards a collapse due to climate change and deforestation. Qurut is about a woman who cooks quruti, one of the most popular meals in the entire Afghanistan, especially in central Afghanistan. For some years people have been making less and less quruti as they struggle to feed their animals because the mountain pastures have dried up.

In One Drag tells the story of a man who leaves a building late in the evening to light a cigarette and smoke it in one drag. He casually flicks the stub away, and then all the cigarette butts in the city become alive. Tant de Forets is a short film based on a poem of Jacques Prévert which speaks of the irony of the fact that newspapers warn us about deforestation although they are made of paper themselves.

The EU signed a cooperation agreement with Cultural Center of the Philippines (CCP) this year, which immediately was translated to EuroPelikula, a platform to feature films from Europe at the CCP, but was unfortunately stopped due to the pandemic.

The Allied Festival section of the Cinemalaya Festival features selected shorts from international film programs, held in collaboration with the Japan Foundation, European Union, the Embassy of the Islamic Republic of Iran, and the Embassy of Mexico.

From The Japan Foundation’s Eiga Sai Film Festival, the films My Little Goat by director Misato Tomoki, and A Japanese Boy Who Draws by director Kawajiri Masanao will be screened.

From Iran, the film I am American by director Omid Mirzaei will be featured.

From Mexico, the film Bruma by writer and director Max Zunino will be shown.

In view of the COVID-19 situation, the 16th edition of Cinemalaya has migrated to the online platform Vimeo. For details, visit www.cinemalaya.org or www.culturalcenter.gov.ph, or contact the CCP Media Arts at 8832-1125 local 1704 to 1705 and the CCP Box Office at 8832-3704.  Check out the official CCP and Cinemalaya Facebook and Instagram accounts.

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