The 10th Cinemanila Film Festival awarded its top prize to Israeli film The Band's Visit, directed by Eran Kolirin, it was announced on Monday night (Oct 20).

The bittersweet comedy about an Egyptian police band arriving at a wrong destination in Israel beat six other films in the main competition to bag the festival's Lino Brocka Grand Prize.

The Amazing Truth About Queen Raquela, a Cinderella story with a transsexual character, received the Grand Jury Prize. The semi-documentary, a co-production between Iceland, the Philippines and France directed by Olaf de Fleur Johannesson, was this year's Teddy Award recipient at the Berlinale.

In the South-East Asian competition, top honors went to The Confessional, a first feature by Jerrold Tarog and Ruel Antipuesto from the Philippines, repeating a prior win in the First Features section at the 10th Osian's Cinefan film festival in New Delhi.

Imburnal by Anthony Sherad Sanchez took the top award in the Philippine competition while past Cinemanila winner, Raya Martin received the Jury Prize for Next Attraction.

Festival Director Tikoy Aguiluz has spearheaded his festival to an eventful decade which has seen its current slate expand to a hundred titles in various programmes.

However organisational and scheduling issues still persist such as this year when festival dates were moved from August to October for closer proximity to its Pusan counterpart.

Topics