AMIDST THE frou-frou, frills, and fancy reinterpretations of the traditional baro’t saya, including exaggerated sleeves, handpainted skirts, and elaborate bead work and cutouts, the most simple rendition won the first “Balik Saya” fashion design competition, which aims to modernize and re-introduce the Maria Clara dress as a classic but wearable garb.

YOU CAN count the designers who participated in this season’s Philippine Fashion Week with the fingers two hands. The fashion extravaganza was once held in convention centers, but the Holiday 2018 shows now has to squeeze itself in a few rooms in Discovery Primea, during the weekend (as opposed to blocking off a whole week, as it sued to do). At least, with less people in the tussle, one could really take a good look at the clothes, which may encourage some to buy a few pieces for showing off during the holidays.

THE RISE of the fashionable sneaker -- the result of casual Friday’s inexorable creep across the rest of the week -- has footwear retailers scrambling to adjust.

DE BEERS, which almost single-handedly created the allure of diamonds as rare, expensive and the symbol of eternal love, now wants to sell you some party jewelry that is anything but.

WASHINGTON — President Donald Trump on Wednesday broke his silence about the racism row engulfing supporter Roseanne Barr, not to condemn her outburst but to attack ABC television for purported media bias.

NEW YORK — Movie producer Harvey Weinstein was indicted on Wednesday on charges of rape and a criminal sexual act, Manhattan District Attorney Cyrus Vance said, the first case to emerge from a slew of sexual misconduct allegations against him.

WHEN DIRECTOR Christopher Nolan showed 2001: A Space Odyssey to his young children years ago, one of them had a question:

NOT LONG AFTER Brillante Mendoza’s Amo (which takes its cue from Respeto’s rap-driven score) we have Lav Diaz’s take on the Duterte regime. Panahon ng Halimaw (Season of the Devil, 2018) is no small-scale response: 234 minutes long, some six minutes short of four hours. And it’s a musical.

NEW YORK — Michael Jackson’s estate sued ABC on Wednesday, arguing that a special the network aired last week about the pop singer’s final days used his songs and music videos without permission.

ANG PANAHON ng Halimaw (Season of the Devil) is a musical, the way the pasyon (passion play) may be broadly and loosely defined as a musical. There are 33 songs, of varied forms, uneven musicality and occasionally strained rhymes, all of them written and arranged by the director Lav Diaz. The incantatory refrains are mesmerizing and primal as katutubo (indigenous persons) chants, especially as rendered by the Kwentista (Bituin Escalante as the Narrator, a sort of omniscient muse). Amazingly, these musical sequences are one-take wonders, performed without any instrumental accompaniment.

4 films to see on the week of June 1-8, 2018

WASHINGTON — Tensions between Washington and Moscow are at an all-time high. US intelligence sees Russian spies around every corner, disrupting government, and stealing secrets.