Highlights
- Filipino-Australian indie film 'The Neon Across the Ocean' screens in Cinema Rehiyon 2021
- Indie filmmaker Matthew Victor Pastor produced the film during the pandemic
- The film tells relevant issues in a post pandemic society
On its 13th year, Cinema Rehiyon Film festival goes global through the online platform and for the first time, a Filipino-Australian film entitled 'The Neon Across the Ocean' is featured.
Although producing the film was challenging in the midst of the COVID-19 pandemic, film director and writer Matthew Victor Pastor shares he is grateful that his film is finally screening in his homeland after its first screening in the 44th São Paulo International Film Festival in Brazil.
"It feels fantastic. Now the second screening is in the Philippines. It feels fitting. I feel proud that it is going to be featured in the motherland."
The film 'The Neon Across the Ocean' is set sometime in the not-too-distant future after the worldwide crisis of 2020. It follows the story of a 17-year-old Filipino Australian, Mandy who is in her final year of high school and dealing with her parents impending divorce. She navigates a world driven by a new normal of isolation and fear. Added to this, she has a crush on her tutor Serena, while a young girl from the backstreets of Manila tells her story.
Indie Filmmaker Matthew Victor Pastor Source: Matthew Victor Pastor
"Some of the themes are the feeling and longing for motherland, the feeling and longing of being in love with someone but not knowing what to do, feeling and longing of wanting to be close to someone but can’t. I think these are very relevant issues in a post pandemic society." says Mr Pastor.
He adds that the film is different from all the other films he created considering he needed to tweak it because of the world-wide pandemic.
"This one is focused on a sentimental tone and its got a peotic lingering because the actual theme is distant. We were supposed to go to the Philippines but then the pandemic struck so I thought how do I pivot the film."
As a Filipino who is culturally displaced in this diaspora, Mr Pastor thinks the neon has something that he can relate to.
"The neon symbolises home and hope, darkness too and also how truthful it is, how everything is beautiful drenched in neon."
Aside from its screening, Mr Pastor will also be a part of an online panel discussion with all the other filmmakers.
