This year had a really strong lineup of films (and a really good lineup for the non-competing entries as well.) Time and distance proved to be a limiting factor for me, so I really managed to see only the competition films and one (free) screening, the 2015 documentary Human. I missed the first hour or so of Human so I haven't written about it yet; as the entire unedited film is available on Youtube, I'll probably write something about it later on.
I personally didn't have much of a problem with the screenings, although for the first few days the tickets at Robinson's Galleria were being sold as Reserved Seats (meaning you pick a seat and you sit there) instead of General Seating (where you buy a ticket then sit anywhere you want). That meant a few incidents of people sitting in seats that others had reserved for themselves. They fixed it later on and both theaters were pretty big, so it was not really a big deal.
One more thing: the brochure with synopses for each film wasn't available to us until later that week (I noticed them around the 29th, with two days left in the festival.) Brochures with synopses and a list of films (not just schedules, this is important) are very useful for the moviegoer without access to the internet or knowledge of all the films. (It would also make the job for the info booth nearby far easier.) There were also some reports of technical glitches or delayed screenings, but as I didn't experience any of that during my three days watching movies, I don't have anything more to say about it.
It's all part of the growing pains of a relatively new festival, so I hope the people in charge take this as a learning experience for next year. As for the things that I thought were awesome: there were lots of forums! I missed seeing this in (for example) Cinemalaya as of late. I think the financing structure for the films and ownership terms are far better for this festival. It would be nice to have a place where people could talk about the film they just watched, but that's wishful thinking, I guess. I'm personally excited to see what films come up next year.
Competition Film Impressions
With most of the films being high quality, ranking them is even harder, so I won't even try. I'm not including Matangtubig to be fair because I didn't see the opening sequence. If you really, REALLY asked me to rank them, it would be, in descending order, something like this:
Patintero was my favorite film of the lot, but it is by no means the best overall film. Sleepless was fantastic and I would have personally rated it higher, but some of those animated sequences really didn't work for me. Overall, Apocalypse Child is the most accomplished film with a great cast to boot, and I guess the jury agreed. Water Lemon is a really solid drama and probably Lorca's best film to date. I won't stop talking about how I loved Iisa's sound design. It's excellent. Also, its heavy, relevant drama with great performances, though I wanted a bit more from the ending. Kapatiran really depends on your interpretation of the material, and Gayuma tried hard, but fell a bit short on the storytelling side of things.
QCinema by the numbers:
And finally, on a lighter note: here is, based on my observations, QCinema by the numbers:
200 Screenings
8 Competition Films
6 Cinemas
3 Malls
1 City
2 Lav Diaz Cameos
2 Menggie Cobarrubias appearances
3 Rebuffed Attempts at courtship by Menggie Cobarrubias (at least)
5 Pairs of Boobies (at least; from all films)
1 pawis sa kilikili (ay titingin yan)
8 Patintero Teams
1 TIGER RUSH
1 Ultraman Pose
2-3 Lubed Up Fighting Midgets
1 Fireball in Hand
2 Characters Named Joy (1 Chicken, one Girlfriend)
379561395 Broken Bottles and Glasses in Apocalypse Child
and finally
0 people who would've guessed the QCinema theme song from that weird hum*.
See you guys at Cinema One Originals.
*joking aside, that was a fun spot.
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