PH’s ‘Transit’ is Front-Runner in Busan Filmfest
A scene from the Philippines drama movie about OFWs in Israel, ‘Transit’.
“Transit” from first-time director Hannah Espia has made it into the final field in the New Currents competition at the 18th Busan International Film Festival (BIFF).
The film explores the stories of five migrant families who decide to hide their children from authorities in Israel rather than abide by a controversial law ― introduced in the country in 2011 ― which forbids foreign workers from marrying or having children while on contract in the country.
“I wanted to show the lives of children born in foreign lands, and their struggles with identity,” Espia told a press conference.
“The [children] are the new people of the diaspora. They are in a constant search for where they belong,” said Espia, adding that she had been inspired to write the film after a chance meeting with a migrant worker who was bringing his five-month-old son home to live with relatives.
“Transit” has already caused a sensation in the Philippines, whose millions of overseas workers keep the economy afloat with dollar remittances.
The submission list for the 86th Annual Academy Awards’ foreign-language category is complete, with a record 76 countries selecting (last year, a then-record 71 countries submitted in the end).
Among them are several high profile films from the international film festival circuit: Iran (which after much speculation they wouldn’t submit, decided to go for it with Ashgar Farhadi’s mostly France-set “The Past,” two years after Farhadi won for “A Separation”), France (which selected Gilles Bourdos’ “Renoir” after Abdellatif Kechiche’s Palme d’Or winner “Blue is the Warmest Color didn’t meet the release date eligibility requirements), Chile (submitting Berlinale favorite “Gloria”), Canada (going for four in a row with Louise Archambault’s Locarno Film Fest favourite “Gabrielle”), Japan (controversially submitting “The Great Passage” over heavy favorite and Cannes prize winner “Like Father, Like Son), Italy (Cannes favorite “The Great Beauty”), Belgium (Felix van Groeningen’s “The Broken Circle Breakdown”), Hong Kong (Wong Kar-wai’s “The Grandmaster”) and Saudi Arabia (submitting for the very first time with Haifaa al-Mansour’s “Wadjda,” the first film in the country ever to be directed by a woman, no less).
Indiewire released the early favorites in Oscars 2014 but this movie wasnt mentioned…sad to say another wrong choice of Film Academy of the Philppines ..Until when the people in FAP will choose not so good movie for Oscars..Just Asking..I hope politics in FAP would end.