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Aswang

Directed by Alyx Ayn Arumpac

Produced by Armi Rae S. Cacanindin

Co-Produced by Les Films de l’oeil sauvage, Stray Dog Productions AS, Razor Film Produktion GmbH, Roman Paul and Gerhard Meixner as coproducers from Razor Film Produktion GmbH

Cinematography by Tanya Haurylchyk, Alyx Ayn Arumpac

Editing by Anne Fabini, Fatima Bianchi

Duration: 85 minutes, Color

When Rodrigo Duterte is voted president of the Philippines, he sets in motion a machinery of death to execute suspected drug peddlers, users, and small-time criminals. Aswang follows people whose fates entwine with the growing violence during two years of killings in Manila.

Synopsis: In two years, over 20,000 men, women and children are killed in Duterte’s war against drugs in the Philippines. Documenting the growing violence and traversing through Manila’s underbelly into the homes of victims, Aswang follows a little boy born into this cruel system and a man who tries to fight it. Jomari, 6, fends for himself as he waits for his mother who is imprisoned on drug charges. The streets are a big game of survival for him, where fantasy and reality mix easily. He tells the filmmaker that the police sometimes ask him for information on drug users in his neighborhood. One day, he disappears. Brother Jun, a religious brother and a photojournalist, spends his evenings going after crime scenes and funerals to document the cases and help the people bury the dead. Being a member of the clergy in a deeply religious society, they openly pour out their stories and sorrows to him. Victims also tell him of abuses by drug enforcement police, including a secret jail where they detain and torture people to extort money. Brother Jun and his colleagues expose the secret jail, but with a disastrous aftermath.