By Joseph B.A. Marzan
“Even if the virus is scary, when hunger comes, people will find ways to get food. So when hunger comes, your fear disappears.”
This was one of the most poignant lines from “Ginhawa” (Breathe), an Ilonggo documentary about life in Iloilo City during the Enhanced Community Quarantine (ECQ) period, which has been making waves in one of the world’s biggest independent film festivals.
The hour-long documentary film by Kevin Piamonte and Kenneth Dela Cruz made its world premiere on October 11 at the Amsterdam Lift-Off Film Festival 2020, the seventh part of the global Lift-Off Film Festival season.
Like all prior editions of the 2020 Lift-Off Film Festival, the Dutch edition is also hosted online due to the continuing coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19).
The film is under the Pathfinder Features category, along with other independent films by renowned directors.
It features different activities from various perspectives during the height of the ECQ in April.
These include the more-known sides, such donations personal protective equipment (PPE) to a hospital and providing food for policemen.
The other side of the documentary features activities unseen during those times, such as the “unusual” celebration of the Catholic Lenten season, and the life of coastal communities in the shores of Arevalo district.
It was shot entirely via mobile phone “to give voice and vision to the communities in [Iloilo City]”.
Piamonte and Dela Cruz had previously worked together on the short film “Bukog”, which was part of the Cultural Center of the Philippines’ (CCP) Gawad Alternatibo Para sa Pelikula at Video.
The Ilonggo short film made its premiere during the 16th Cinemalaya Film Festival, which was hosted on the iWantTFC platform.
Piamonte, who is also a communications professor, directed the 2018 docufilm “Lugta ke Tamama” (Land From God), about Ati communities in Boracay Island.
The said documentary, shot before the island’s 2018 closure, had its world premiere at the 2018 Busan International Film Festival in South Korea.
It is also one of the featured films in this year’s Pista ng Pelikulang Pilipino from Oct. 31 to Nov. 15, 2020.
Dela Cruz told Daily Guardian in an interview that the film was developed when they went around the city with an “aim to breathe”.
He said there was actually no intention for them to make the documentary, and it was only borne out of conversations with people and families from the coast of Villa Baybay in Arevalo.
“From the title itself, we want to be able to breathe. So we started going around and explored the city. When we started, we had no idea of what we were going to do. We went to Villa Baybay to breathe. At first, we had no intention to make a documentary. It was only until we got to know the fisherfolk on the beach sides, who shared a lot of their struggles during quarantine,” Dela Cruz said in the interview.
Piamonte shared that the structure of the documentary really came from parts of the conversations which involved arrested fishermen, and relief goods from the local government, among other stories.
“The fishermen were being arrested, and they told us that authorities were waiting for them to come back to the shore to cuff them. The families were telling us the relief goods wouldn’t be enough, and that they would rather eat their catch for that day,” Piamonte said.
As of the film festival’s last day, Oct. 18, “Ginhawa” garnered up to 64 percent of the audience vote.
Dela Cruz said that their hope for the film was to be able to provide another perspective of the earlier lockdowns in the city.
“After watching Ginhawa, I hope that people who have been under quarantine for a long time will be given a different perspective of that time (ECQ), which was better for them who are comfortable in their homes, unlike those who are actually struggling outside,” he said.
Piamonte said that he personally hopes the docufilm will help people feel better as well.
“Ginhawa is also like a sharing of our experience, because after that, we also felt better. We experienced living outside of our homes, seeing what’s happening around, instead of staying at home and living in fear. In a way, what we did is we embraced fear, and we lived it,” he said.
The two filmmakers hope to be able to premiere the documentary to local audiences “when the opportunity comes”.
