BAKUNAWA FEST [Fantastic Film, Art + Music] - (formerly Bakunawa Young Cinema) - is the first fantastic & genre-based film, art & music festival based in The Philippines currently presented by Negros Museum and E Unlimited; and ran by volunteer filmmakers and artists. Bakunawa is a dragon-like creature in Philippine mythology that devoured moons. Because we are a genre-bending film fest, we want to flip the Bakunawa's role and we want it to instead symbolize the creative monsters inside us.
On its tenth year, Bakunawa Fest adds a new cinema to its in-person fest screenings: UPFI Film Center in Quezon City, Metro Manila. Across the islands, The Negros Museum remains our main venue in Bacolod City, Negros Occidental in Western Visayas Region. This year, Bakunawa Fest X opens on September 18, 2023 and will have a five-day physical festival run with a Bakunawa Funtastik Fair at the UPFI Film Center while we're having the Film Camp (after the lockdowns) for first-time filmmakers in selected sites. [Filipino students who want to join the FILM CAMP, pls email us at bakunawafilmfest@gmail.com]
Bakunawa Fest runs annually in one season - spread in fourth months becoming a hybrid festival resulting from the pandemic lockdowns. Bakunawa Fest starts with a film camp which includes a series of film workshops for first time young filmmakers that culminates into a competition - their final works are mostly genre films (horror, sci-fi, fantasy, folk, noir, folk, etc). From the Film Camp, Bakunawa Fest celebrates the year's crop of genre films through both an online and in-person festival screenings (with competitive and curated sections) of local and international films making their Philippine Premiere. Bakunawa Fest ends its season run with Primetime Philippine Cable TV airing and an Awards Show via SolarFlix TV where we can reach to millions of Filipino viewers.
Bakunawa was initially created with this principle: "new visions, new voices". We still stand by this principle as we continue to program young promising filmmakers, artists & musicians who either have no access to expensive workshops and may not have the name recognition to be programmed in festivals. Since our third edition, we have included a section that screens curated local and international selected films mainly for educational purposes. Most of our Bakunawa Fest's film camps are done as outreach programs/workshops and are mostly free. Here our participants are scholars paid for by the festival and its partners usually hosted by different cities/municipalities in the Philippines.
During the pandemic years and lockdowns from 2020-2022, we have temporarily migrated to mostly online screenings but this year 2023, we will conduct more live screenings following health protocols. For our tenth edition, we will do a semi-hybrid festival wherein we screen more films in live venues and do a limited program online.
[ Please note that, since we are an artist and volunteer-ran filmfest, we can't fund filmmakers to come physically and we don't pay screening fees. ]
We are a fantastic film fest. Our festival is interested in: Horror or Thriller Films / Sci-Fi, Fantasy or Adventure / Experimental Films / New Media, Expanded Cinema / Genre-Bending Films / Music Videos / Creative Documentaries / Contemporary Art / Photography.
For 2023, we have made our submissions more streamlined (This is NOT our programming approach though, just for submissions):
► Fantastic Full-legth Features
► Fantastic International Shorts
► Fantastic Indigenous Shorts
► Fantastic Filipino Shorts
► BAKUNAWA FEST Alumni Filmmakers
► Midnight Films
► Digital Art & Photography
► One-Minute Films
► Trash, B-Movie-esque, Underground Shorts
► Rewind (Past films released earlier than 2021)
► Pinoy Horror (no restrictions, no premiere status required)
OUR PROGRAMMING PRINCIPLE - A NOTE ON FILM SUBMISSIONS
Our programmers pride themselves on watching all submitted films with an annual 98-100% watching average. We don't base our decisions on which festivals your film has been accepted. We decide on the merit of your film and not on the popularity of the filmmakers and its actors. Last year (9th edition), all 100% of our competition shorts came from submissions via FilmFreeway, Festhome and Bakunawa Forms. Bakunawa has two festival advisers and curators who recommend films from around the world - especially, Asia - but these recommendations still has to pass through our chief programmer and are mostly programmed out of competition. So just submit and don't send us all your laurels. While we are happy of your achievements (because we're filmmakers too!), we still look at each film at "face value" - we watch them (usually more than twice) and decide.
Bakunawa Fest determines the films for competition and outside of the competition sections. The appointed Board of Jury will award films in competition and is only required to award GRAND BAKUNAWA FOR BEST SHORT FILM and JURY PRIZE. The Jury however decides if they want to award films on specific categories. International Winners get a Digital Certificate and Digital Kit while local winners get a printed Certificate and the Bakunawa trophies.
Film Critics invited by our festival also hand out independent awards & citations which were either deliberated or selected by them. Bakunawa team of organizers don't participate in these processes as we want to maintain the critics' independence. The festival hands out Digital Certificates to those cited by the film critics.
BAKUNAWA FEST 9 JURIED WINNERS
🐉 Grand Bakunawa for Best Short Film: the night is drunk when we suffer by RS Magtaan (Philippines)
🐉Grand Jury Prize: 永別 (Part Forever) by Chung An Ou Alan (Taiwan)
🐉Best Director: Alvin Belarmino, Hinakdal (The Philippines)
🐉Best Director: Chung An Ou Alan, 永別 Part Forever (Taiwan)
🐉Best Performance: Ming Yang, 永別 Part Forever (Taiwan)
🐉Best Performance: Laurent Le Doyen, Laura (France)
🐉Best Cinematography: OparÁ , Director of Photography: João Vicente (Brazil)
🐉Best Story & Screenplay: Hinakdal (Resentment) written by Arvin Belarmino & Kyla Romero (The Philippines)
🧜Special Jury Citation: Pretty Pickle by Jim Vendiola (USA)
🧜Jury Citation for Fantastic Animation: Brindis by Catalina Bórquez Bugueño (Chile) & The Sprayer by Farnoosh Abedi (Iran)
NON-JURIED WINNERS
🧚Certificate of Distinction [Opening Short Film] : Wong Asu (Legend of Dogman) by Aco Tenriyagelli (Indonesia)
🧚Certificate of Distinction [Opening Short Film] : Parallax by Hayato Nove (Japan)
🧚Certificate of Distinction [Opening Short Film] : OparÁ by Mateus Guedes (Brazil)
🧚Certificate of Distinction as Closing Film : Khu Rừng Của Páo (Pao's Forrest) by Nguyễn Phạm Thành Đạt (Vietnam)
🍿Box Office Champion (Full-length Features) & Audience Award (Full-length Features) :
El Verano Que Te Vimos (The Summer We Saw You) by Tomás Roldán (Argentina)
🍿Box Office Champion (Shorts / Music Videos) & Audience Award (Shorts / Music Videos) : Sa Kalaut Sang Katobtoban (The End of Eternity) by Jael Mathea Tipon (The Philippines)
* READ COMPLETE CITATIONS AT https://www.bakunawafestival.com/winners-bakunawa9 *