All-Baguio cast, crew push film to top indie awards

The first thing one would notice about Martin Masadao’s “Anac ti Pating” (Son of Shark) is that it is probably the only movie with Ilocano and English dialogues. And if one has to ask, then he or she has not stayed in Baguio long enough.

“Anac ti Pating” bagged the Grand Jury Prize in the 2nd National Film Festival of the Film Development Council of the Philippines held last month in Davao City.

Deuel Raynon Ladia, the child hero named “Sixto Mangaoang” in Anac ti Pating, also bagged the Best Actor award.

Masadao, a first-time film director, said he watched most of the films and was overwhelmed by their technical quality. However, he believed it was Anac ti Pating’s storyline and acting that won the jury’s hearts.

It was a simple story of a coming-of-age of a Baguio boy whose family is a caretaker of a mansion. But it was the nuances that made the film heartwarming.

There are the subplots of school bullying (where Sixto had to submit the math assignments of the bully), friendships with a veteran doctor neighbor who reminisced about the old Baguio (Doctor Rayos played by Dr. Charles Macalalag) and a young Korean student (Steve Chong as Clark Hong), petty school corruption and dysfunctional families (Luchie Maranan and Nick Prill Calinao as Mayette and Fredo Mangaoang).

And then there’s Baguio.

Masadao, a prize-winning production designer, painstakingly looked for locations to show the typical Baguio.

The charming house which the Mangaoangs took care of is the Rodriguez house on Yangco Street. There is also a scene where Sixto and Clark slid down the hills of Camp John Hay using cardboard as sleds and pine needles as “snow.”

Then there’s the shark. Masadao said the inspiration came from an article he read in Time magazine about the remains of a shark found in the forest of New Hampshire, which is far from the ocean.

Masadao wrote his script (known as “Son of Jaws” among friends) in four months and cast his friends from the Baguio Writers Group and the community media as actors. Frank Cimatu