From long-running franchises like “Shake, Rattle & Roll” to floating coffins in “Magandang Gabi Bayan,” horror has always had a special place in Filipino lives. Maybe it’s the deeply rooted superstitions and the religiosity, or maybe it’s the years of colonization and corruption. Either way, horror has always found its way to our screens — as a source not only of cheap thrills but also of connection and community, especially as it reflects many growing anxieties and fears in the modern era.
There are few contemporary Filipino filmmakers left who understand how to communicate these feelings in a film language that gets seared into the brain. So when Kenneth Dagatan, at the time a film student from the University of San Carlos in Cebu, burst into the filmmaking scene in 2015 with “Sanctissima,” a short film about a woman who feeds her demonic child fetuses she gathers from botched abortions, it felt like there was another person who could be terrifying and affecting in equal measure.
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