FOR ITS third year, the Tingin ASEAN Film Festival focuses on the “notion of place” as it presents 10 films from the Association of Southeast Nation member countries.

MEDIEVAL DRAMA Game of Thrones and British comedy Fleabag took top honors at the Emmy awards on Sunday on a night of upsets that often rewarded newcomers over old favorites.

LOS ANGELES — The annual Emmy awards, celebrating the best in television, were handed out at a ceremony in Los Angeles on Sunday.

VETERAN DIRECTOR, writer, and production designer Carmelo “Mel” Chionglo passed away on Sept. 21 at the age of 73. His death was confirmed by the artistic director of the Cultural Center of the Philippines (CCP), Chris B. Millado on Saturday via his personal Facebook page. “[I’m] very sad to announce the passing of a colleague and renowned film director Mel Chionglo. The happiest of journeys gentle Mel,” Mr. Millado said in his post.

FROM OCT. 3 to 13, the 18^th edition of PELÍCULA Spanish Film Festival will feature the best of contemporary Spanish cinema at Greenbelt 3 in Makati. Presented by Instituto Cervantes, the Embassy of Spain, Turespaña, and the Film Development Council of the Philippines (FDCP), the 2019 Spanish Film Festival will screen more than 20 films under the motto “18 Years advocating quality films on the Big Screen.”

VERDICT, about the trial of a wife-beater, is the Philippines’ official entry to the 2020 Oscars for the Foreign Language Film Category. The shaky hand-held camera and harshly lit settings, give it the noisome, nitty-gritty feel of raw reality in the developing world. This has its charms for many of the culturati in the antiseptic First World film festival circuit. However, if you are prone to motion sickness, the prolonged exposure to so much juddering and bobbing up and down, or jerkily weaving left to right, may cause your gorge to rise.

CINEMA as an art form is show and tell. As for visuality, Watch Me Kill is as purely and poetically cinematic as it gets. The film was not shot digitally but with a classic Kodak 16mm film camera. This is evident in the richness and the careful craftsmanship of the somberly elegant cinematography by Marvin Szocinski, the director Tyrone Acierto’s long-time collaborator. As Acierto wrote in his director’s statement: “There’s a certain texture that cannot be duplicated when shooting with film versus digital. Our test shoot revealed this when we compared the results side by side. We made the decision to shoot the whole film on Super 16mm primarily because the texture we so wanted to exalt is heightened with the use of actual film negative.”

IN THESE troubled times, there’s something sweetly subversive about serving up a film with a happy ending that could believably happen. LSS daringly does just that. True, life isn’t always easy for its protagonists: the aspiring singer/song writer Sarah (Gabbi Garcia) and Zack (Khalil Ramos), the wholesome boy-next-door. Among the film’s highlights is his good-natured sparring with his larger than life, blue-haired and tattooed mother Ruby (Tuesday Vargas) as they routinely but affectionately curse each other out.

VISUAL NOVELS (VNs) are niche games not often seen in western markets, and for good reason. Most VNs are characterized by their manga/anime art style, a design choice that may well appear childish and cartoony to those otherwise predisposed to realism. Add to this a predilection for often-cheesy accounts heavy on fan service, and it’s easy to see why the genre is seen as an acquired taste. Which is not to say all VNs are overlooked and fated to land in the dustbins of mediocrity. In fact, quite a few VNs have cultivated loyal followings, both in Japan and abroad; they distinguish themselves by injecting interesting gameplay elements alongside rich plots. Utawarerumono: Mask of Deception is one such example; localized for Western audiences two and a half years ago, it even goes a step further, moving to combine a compelling-enough turn-based combat system alongside a deliberately textured narrative.

IF TIME were a true test of anything, then objects may matter more than we do. We would be long dead and gone, but the objects we would have acquired through the years will still be gathering dust by the time we would have turned into it.

MILAN -- Pop star and actress Jennifer Lopez strutted down the Milan catwalk on Friday, closing the Versace fashion show in a recreation of the plunging jungle-themed gown she wore to the Grammy Awards nearly 20 years ago.

AMERICAN skincare brand, Kiehl’s, has launched its own online shopping service in the Philippines where customers can get the “same high-quality skincare consultation from Kiehl’s customer service representatives at the comfort of their homes,” according to a press release.