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Romanian film of sex and aggression in the city wins Berlinale

BERLIN —  The Romanian director Radu Jude’s Bad Luck Banging or Loony Porn, a sexually explicit dark comedy of the everyday aggression experienced by a teacher in contemporary Bucharest, won the Berlin Film Festival’s Golden Bear award.

Judges hailed the film, starring Katia Pascariu as the teacher whose private sex tape is leaked, triggering a witch hunt by parents of the children at her school, as a “lasting art work” that “attacked” the viewer.

“It captures on screen the very content and essence, the mind and body, the values and raw flesh of our present moment in time,” Israeli director and jury member Nadav Lapid said announcing the award.

Other prizewinners at this year’s online Berlinale included German actress Maren Eggert, who played a woman resisting a perfect android’s charms in I’m Your Man and Hungary’s Denes Nagy, awarded best director for the war movie Natural Light.

The overall winner opens with a lengthy shot of Ms. Pascariu having sex in porn style and continues showing the dozens of aggressive acts she deals with running errands in Romania’s frenetic capital.

Irritable shopkeepers, swearing car drivers, strident advertising hoardings, and the Romanian Orthodox Church all attract the film’s gaze.

“I wanted to show as much as possible the values of the community through the tissues of the city,” Mr. Jude told an online news conference —  a chaotic 1920s cityscape by German expressionist painter Nikolaus Braun as his background image. “How the buildings are, the culture of parking —  all these things say a lot about the values,” he added.

Shot in the midst of the coronavirus pandemic, the film shows almost every character wearing a mask, but the viewer is left with the sense that the poison people inject into their own environment is as destructive as any virus.

The film culminates in a grotesque tribunal composed of the middle-class parents of pupils at the elite school where Ms. Pascariu teaches. Paragons of virtue, they carefully scrutinize her sex tape before passing judgment.

Producer Ada Solomon acknowledged the film would have to be censored for its most explicit scenes for wider distribution, but questioned the values that made this necessary.

“Violence is accepted, nudity not,” she said. “I wonder why that is?”

Festival organizers hope to show this year’s films in cinemas at a live follow-up event in June, pandemic permitting. — Reuters

Mobile number portability seen to help DITO corner 30% of telco market

By Arjay L. Balinbin, Senior Reporter

DITO Telecommunity Corp. said on Monday the planned implementation of the mobile number portability law would help the company achieve its target of capturing 30% of the telco market.

“Now, ‘yung laban natin (the competition) will really be on the quality of service,” DITO Chief Administrative Officer Adel A. Tamano said at a virtual briefing, noting that switching telecommunication networks will be easier once consumers are allowed to retain their contact digits.

“What mobile number portability does is that you can keep your number, and you are not forced to stay with the current telco that you have,” he added.

DITO Chief Technology Officer Rodolfo D. Santiago said the new telco player, which launched its mobile services in Metro Cebu and Metro Davao on Monday, targets to corner 30% of the market “as soon as possible.”

DITO is currently capable of serving 37.48% of the country’s population based on the technical audit report by R.G. Manabat & Co.

Thirty percent of the telco market is “more than enough” for DITO to be profitable, according to Mr. Santiago.

“(But) we cannot achieve the 30% market share with just 37% (national population coverage),” he noted.

“Pinakamadali siyang ma-achieve kapag 84% na ‘yung population coverage or higher (Achieving the target is easier if we increase our population coverage to 84% or higher),” Mr. Santiago explained.

The telco has a commitment to cover 84% of the population and provide an internet speed of at least 55 megabits per second (Mbps) by the end of its fifth year of commercial operations.

“We’re not contemplating on achieving the five-year commitment of 84% in five years; we want to achieve that very soon,” Mr. Santiago said.

The Securities and Exchange Commission approved in January last year the creation of the Telecommunications Connectivity, Inc. that would ease the portability of mobile phone numbers.

The new company would enable number porting services in line with the new mobile number portability initiative of the government or Republic Act No. 11202, also known as the Mobile Number Portability Act.

It was jointly put up by the country’s major telecommunications companies.

“We are fixing a few things. But maybe by July, it will be available to the public,” Mr. Tamano said, referring to the actual start of the implementation of the mobile number portability law.

Raya and the Last Dragon tops sluggish box office with $8.6 million

LOS ANGELES —  New York City movie theaters welcomed back customers for the first time in nearly a year this weekend. And yet some high profile new releases still struggled to sell tickets, a sign that a box office revival may not be in the cards for a few months. Disney’s Raya and the Last Dragon, a computer-animated fantasy adventure, opened to $8.6 million from 2,045 screens. That failed to match the impressive (for a pandemic) debut of Tom & Jerry which earned $14.1 million last weekend, providing a ray of hope to the long-suffering exhibition sector. Raya and the Last Dragon was also made available to Disney Plus subscribers for a $30 fee, a method that the company previously deployed with Mulan. Though a fraction of what a big-budgeted, family movie would make in pre-COVID times, Raya did earn enough to capture the top spot on domestic box office charts. Globally, Raya earned $26 million with China and Russia providing the largest contributions with $8.4 million and $2.8 million, respectively. Animated features tend to cost substantially more than $100 million to produce —  it’s a sign of just how skewed the world of theatrical distribution has become that a major Disney release would fail to crack $10 million at the box office in its opening weekend. Some of that has to do with Disney’s refusal to give exhibitors a better cut of the box office revenues, with Cinemark and other chains refusing to screen the movie. In its second weekend of release, Warner Bros.’ Tom & Jerry picked up $6.6 million domestically, pushing its haul to $23 million. The film is also streaming on HBO Max. Warner Bros. is releasing its entire 2021 slate on the service at the same time the movies open in theaters, a move that shows the growing importance of streaming to media companies.  Tom & Jerry earned $11.6 million globally from 36 markets, pushing its worldwide gross to $57.3 million. Lionsgate’s Chaos Walking, an oft-delayed and critically maligned fantasy adventure with Tom Holland and Daisy Ridley, grossed an anemic $3.8 million for a third-place finish. Chaos Walking, which is based on a series of popular sci-fi novels, cost a reported $100 million to make, which is bad news for the studio given the paltry opening. It was originally scheduled to debut in Mar. 2019, before it underwent reshoots. The top five was rounded out by Focus Features’ Boogie, a drama about a Queens basketball phenom that was written and directed by chef and author Eddie Huang, as well as by Dreamworks Animation’s The Croods: A New Age. Boogie grossed $1.2 million, while the Croods sequel picked up $780,000 to push its domestic gross to $53.6 million. The Croods: A New Age has grossed $157.7 million worldwide since opening last fall. — Reuters

Solaire operator Bloomberry Resorts incurs P2.5-B net loss

SOLAIRE RESORT & Casino operator Bloomberry Resorts Corp. reported a fourth-quarter net loss of P2.5 billion, a reversal of the P1.4-billion net profit recorded the previous year.

Enrique K. Razon, Jr., Bloomberry chairman and chief executive officer, however welcomed the company’s fourth-quarter performance.

“I am encouraged by our performance in the final quarter of 2020, particularly as we saw domestic mass gaming revenues increase by 75% compared to the previous quarter and EBITDA (earnings before interest, taxes, depreciation, and amortization) hitting positive territory. Our recovery is well underway,” Mr. Razon said in a statement on Monday.

Solaire’s gross gaming revenue (GGR) for the quarter fell by 63% year on year to P5.3 billion from P14.5 billion. It is however a 22% improvement from the previous quarter, which posted a GGR of P4.4 billion.

Revenues from mass tables declined by 55% compared with the previous year to P2 billion, but bested the previous quarter by 78%. Electronic gaming machine (EGM) revenues reached P2.2 billion, a 52% decline from the same period in 2019 but an improvement of 73% from its third-quarter performance in 2020.

VIP gaming revenues meanwhile closed the year with P1.2 billion in the fourth quarter, declining by 78% year on year.

Net gaming revenues decreased by 61% in the quarter to P3.4 billion, while non-gaming revenues amounted to P761.3 million, which is 65% lower than what the company recorded in the same period in 2019.

Consolidated net revenue for the quarter amounted to P4.2 billion, slowing by 61% from the previous year.

The company’s EBITDA for the period amounted to P129.3 million, lower by 97% year on year but a reversal of the recorded loss in the previous quarter at P203.7 million.

For full-year 2020, the company posted a net loss attributable to parent firm equity holders of P8.31 billion, swinging from its net income of P9.92 billion in 2019.

Total revenues for 2020 suffered a 61.9% decline to P17.66 billion from P46.34 billion the previous year.

Bloomberry’s Jeju Sun Hotel & Casino in Korea also closed the year with lower revenues.

Gaming revenues fell by 83.8% to P93.1 million from P573.1, after being closed since March 21, 2020. Non-gaming revenues meanwhile declined by 80% year on year to P25.9 million.

Jeju Sun is still closed as the management delayed the resumption of its operations, following the absence of foreign tourists in Jeju Island.

“We look forward to a more meaningful improvement in 2021 should we see further easing of domestic quarantine restrictions and the eventual resumption of travel and tourism across our key markets,” Mr. Razon said.

“Our pre-eminent priority as our recovery progresses remains to be the wellbeing of our guests and team members. This concern has manifested in the form of sanitation and safety investments at Solaire valued at over P400 million for the year, ensuring our position as the leader in excellence, safety and health security among our peers in the Philippines and the region,” he added.

Bloomberry and partner company International Container Terminal Services, Inc. have acquired three million doses of the Oxford-AstraZeneca coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) vaccine, of which at least 50% will be donated to the Philippine government.

The two are also in advanced procurement negotiations for some 20 million doses of the Moderna vaccine.

“We stay true to our intrinsic obligation to help our countrymen as we assist the Philippine Government in procuring Oxford-AstraZeneca and Moderna COVID-19 vaccines,” Mr. Razon said.

“Outside of vaccines, the Bloomberry Cultural Foundation, Inc., has donated over P850 million worth of medical supplies, relief goods, and health infrastructure funding. We are eager to see a healthy post-pandemic world emerge through our continuing CSR efforts,” Mr. Razon added.

Shares of Bloomberry Resorts Corp. at the stock exchange inched down by 0.64% on Monday to P7.80 per share from P7.85. — Keren Concepcion G. Valmonte

Disneyland, other California theme parks, stadiums could reopen April 1

LOS ANGELES —  California health officials set new rules on Friday that would allow Disneyland and other theme parks, stadiums and outdoor entertainment venues to reopen as early as Apr. 1, after a closure of nearly a year due to the coronavirus pandemic. But the return of Mickey Mouse to the “Happiest Place on Earth” and live spectators to the California ballparks of America’s favorite pastime still come with major caveats. Theme and amusement parks would be permitted to restart on Apr. 1 with severely limited capacity, but only if the counties where they operate are removed from the “purple” tier of California’s color-coded coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) restrictions, the system’s most stringent classification. Masks and other safety measures would still be required, and the parks initially would be open only to state residents. Attendance would range from 15% to 35% of normal capacity. Outdoor stadiums, ball parks and performance arenas would also be allowed to welcome back live audiences starting Apr. 1, though at a fraction of maximum seating and subject to the same tiered system of constraints. Opening day turnouts for Major League Baseball games would be muted affairs in Southern California, with no more than 100 spectators allowed in venues located in purple-zoned counties. That would include the stadiums of the Los Angeles Dodgers, the San Diego Padres and the Anaheim Angels. San Francisco and Oakland, home of the Giants and the Athletics, respectively, are currently designated red, which would limit seating to 20% capacity. —Reuters

Robinsons Retail to buy back P2-B shares

GOKONGWEI-LED Robinsons Retail Holdings, Inc. will extend the company’s share buyback program for another P2 billion in a move to raise shareholder value.

The program will be facilitated through the Philippine Stock Exchange.

“Our buyback program is in line with our capital allocation policy, which involves our strategies for organic growth, M&As, e-commerce, and higher dividend payouts,” Robinsons Retail President and Chief Executive Officer Robina Gokongwei-Pe said in a statement on Monday.

The additional share buyback would be on top of the P2-billion share buyback program approved on March 9, 2020.

The company said it is in a strong net cash position to implement an additional share buyback program.

“We are confident in the growth trajectory of Robinsons Retail as we venture into more adaptive and agile means of doing business,” Ms. Gokongwei-Pe added.

Robinsons Retail has already repurchased some 24.7 million shares as of early March this year, amounting to P1.5 billion.

The company closed 2020 with a decline of 25.2% in its net income attributable to equity holders to P2.93 billion. Net sales meanwhile decreased 7.3% to P151.03 billion.

Robinsons Retail shares at the stock exchange dropped by 2.25% or P1.20 on Monday, closing at P52.05 apiece. — Keren Concepcion G. Valmonte

Twitter’s Dorsey auctions first ever tweet as digital memorabilia

THE FIRST ever tweet —  “just setting up my twttr” —  is up for sale after Twitter boss Jack Dorsey listed his famous post as a unique digital signature on a website for selling tweets as non-fungible tokens (NFTs). The post, sent from Mr. Dorsey’s account in March of 2006, received offers on Friday that went as high as $88,888.88 within minutes of the Twitter co-founder tweeting a link to the listing on Valuables by Cent —  a tweets marketplace. Old offers for the tweet suggest that it was put for sale in December, but the listing gained more attention after Mr. Dorsey’s tweet on Friday. NFTs are digital files that serve as digital signatures to certify who owns photos, videos and other online media. Mr. Dorsey’s 15-year-old tweet is one of the most famous tweets ever on the platform and could attract bidders to pay a high price for the digital memorabilia. The highest bid for the tweet stood at $2 million at 04:47 GMT on Saturday. The updated offer was made by cryptocurrency pioneer Justin Sun, who won an auction for Warren Buffett’s charity dinner. “I have updated my offer to 2 million USD,” Sun tweeted. Launched three months ago, Valuables compares the buying of tweets with buying an autographed baseball card. “There is only one unique signed version of the tweet, and if the creator agrees to sell, you can own it forever.” A tweet’s buyer will get an autographed digital certificate, signed using cryptography, that will include metadata of the original tweet, according to the Valuables website. The tweet will continue to be available on the Twitter website. — Reuters

SMC to dredge 600,000 tons of silt, waste from Pasig River

DIVERSIFIED conglomerate San Miguel Corp. (SMC) said that it is targeting to annually remove 600,000 tons of silt and solid waste from Pasig River over the next five years, as it awaits the arrival of two units of dredging equipment.

“Through the years, Pasig River has become narrower and shallower because of accumulated silt and waste. By cleaning and widening it, we will be able to increase its capacity to keep water flowing within its banks especially during heavy rains,” SMC President Ramon S. Ang said in a press release on Monday.

The two new units of dredging equipment are said to be capable of pulling 600,000 tons of silt and garbage out of Pasig River’s waters per year for the next five years, SMC said.

It added that it would be partnering up with the Department of Environment and Natural Resources (DENR), the Department of Public Works and Highways, and other concerned government units in extracting 50,000 tons of waste per month from the river.

Mr. Ang said that they were able to identify sections of the river where the depth has been reduced to as little as one meter. According to him, these were the areas which caused widespread flooding.

For the Pasig River to channel flood waters to Manila Bay, it should be at least 10 meters deep, he explained.

SMC said that it plans to begin the river’s clean-up operations by April.

SMC is also undertaking a P1-billion dredging and clean-up initiative in the Tullahan River system, which is seen to benefit flood-prone areas like Malabon and Navotas.

In March 2019, the conglomerate inked a deal with the DENR to implement a comprehensive dredging and clean-up program for the 59.24 kilometer river.

SMC shares in the local bourse were unchanged at P125 apiece on Monday. — Angelica Y. Yang

Real estate optimism focuses on healthcare, retirement

By Jenina P. Ibañez, Reporter

POST-PANDEMIC property investment opportunities are focused on healthcare, offices and retirement, real estate service provider Santos Knight Frank said.

According to the Philippine results of the global Knight Frank survey, individuals with high net worth in the Philippines have a “soft level” of optimism this year.

High net worth individuals (HNWIs) in the population — or those with net worth over $1 million — are interested in healthcare investments, according to almost half of wealth managers surveyed said.

Meanwhile, 42% said they are interested in offices, while others could be more interested in retirement (33%) and industrial and logistics (25%) investments.

“One in every 3 HNWI is also looking to buy a new home primarily to upgrade their family’s main residence, for leisure/holiday, or permanent movement,” Kash A. Salvador, Santos Knight Frank director of investment and capital markets, said in an e-mail on Friday.

Santos Knight Frank, the Philippine affiliate of Knight Frank, said that the coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) pandemic has significantly affected wealthy Filipinos, because most family-led conglomerates have stakes in retail, hospitality, and aviation.

These industries have been battered by the slump in tourism and mall foot traffic, as the government continues to implement restrictions to contain the spread of the virus.

Tourism revenues last year dropped 83% to P81.4 billion after pandemic-related restrictions prompted a significant decline in foreign visitors, the Department of Tourism said.

“A significant number of wealth managers said their clients’ wealth has either remained the same or decreased marginally,” Mr. Salvador said.

“Liquidity has been a priority for HNWIs with businesses, and so we have seen liquidation of assets especially of properties which do not support core businesses.”

Despite the decline last year, the firm is expecting a reversal over a five-year period.

The Knight Frank wealth report 2021 said that the number of super-rich Filipinos is likely to grow between 2020 to 2025, in line with a global trend, after the number dropped last year.

The forecast, the report said, represents “optimism for the emergence of a new economic cycle and set new expectations for the post-pandemic world.”

The firm’s Attitude Survey consulted 600 private bankers and wealth advisors globally between October and November last year. Santos Knight Frank has not yet reported how many were surveyed in the Philippines.

Kim Kardashian says body-shamers ‘really broke me’ during pregnancy

Kim Kardashian — EN.WIKIPEDIA.ORG

LOS ANGELES — Kim Kardashian on Friday called out those who bully and body-shame others, recalling her embarrassment when she was attacked for gaining 60 pounds during her first pregnancy. In an Instagram stories posting, Ms. Kardashian detailed how she had been compared to a killer whale during the later stages of her pregnancy in 2013, and how her figure was contrasted unfavorably to Prince William’s wife Kate, who was also pregnant at the time. “I cried every single day over what was happening to my body, mainly from the pressures of being constantly compared to what society considered a healthy person should look like —  as well as being compared to Shamu the Whale by the media,” she wrote, referring to the mammal that used to perform at SeaWorld. “I was shamed on a weekly basis with cover stories that made my insecurities so painful I couldn’t leave the house for months after. It really broke me,” said Ms. Kardashian, who rose to fame through her family’s reality TV show Keeping Up with the Kardashians. The cosmetics businesswoman and social media star said she was reminded of those months while watching a recent documentary about Britney Spears, tracing the meteoric rise of the pop star and the media coverage of her mental health breakdown in 2007. Ms. Kardashian, 40, said the documentary made her empathize with Ms. Spears. She said the media “can be very traumatizing and it can really break even the strongest person… No-one deserves to be treated with such cruelty or judgment for entertainment,” Ms. Kardashian told her 208 million Instagram followers. Ms. Kardashain gave birth to her daughter North in June 2013. She went on to have a son, Saint, in 2015 and later had two children by a surrogate because of health complications. Ms. Kardashian last month filed for divorce from the rapper Kanye West, her husband of almost seven years. — Reuters

ePLDT launches new cloud commerce platform

EPLDT, the information and communications technology unit of PLDT Enterprise, has launched a cloud-based e-commerce solution called “Salesforce Commerce Cloud,” its top official said on Monday.

“Our commitment is to continuously support businesses of all sizes by enabling them with the latest technologies,” Juan Victor I. Hernandez, ePLDT president and chief executive officer, said in an e-mailed statement.

The latest cloud commerce platform allows businesses to use a “one-stop e-commerce solution and free businesses from the demands of managing various digital channels,” Mr. Hernandez, who is also senior vice-president and head for PLDT and Smart Enterprise Business Groups, added.

ePLDT said it supports complete customer journey across Salesforce CRM service functionality and complementary enterprise applications.

“By connecting Salesforce Commerce Cloud with other Salesforce clouds, businesses can power the entire customer lifecycle — from awareness and acquisition, to purchase and fulfillment, to advocacy and retention,” it explained.

Hastings Holdings, Inc., a unit of PLDT Beneficial Trust Fund subsidiary MediaQuest Holdings, Inc., has a stake in BusinessWorld through the Philippine Star Group, which it controls. — Arjay L. Balinbin

Hospital, wellness center in Megaworld’s Davao township opens

By Maya M. Padillo, Correspondent

DAVAO CITY — The 250-bed Lanang Premiere Doctors Hospital, located within Megaworld Corp.’s Davao Park District, has opened, adding to the medical facilities available in the city as it transitions to the new normal prompted by the ongoing coronavirus pandemic.

Kevin Andrew L. Tan, Megaworld chief strategy officer, said the opening of the hospital within their first township project in Mindanao comes at a time when health services are particularly crucial and new standards in delivering medical care are necessary.   

“This also complements our vision for the township as a thriving community where our residents, office workers, and even visitors have convenient access to a world-class medical facility,” Mr. Tan said via Messenger.

The Lanang Premiere Doctors Hospital, initially planned for full operations in July 2020, was inaugurated on Feb. 27 after hurdling delays due to the pandemic-related restrictions.

It has a 14-storey hospital facility and an adjacent five-floor building for doctor’s clinics.

The hospital has also been designed for medical tourism.

Apart from the hospital, the 11.2-hectare Davao Park District currently houses the Davao Finance Center, an office building targeted for information technology, business process outsourcing, offshore gaming, and other corporate clients.

More than half of the complex will be occupied by four condominium buildings being developed by Megaworld subsidiary Suntrust Properties, Inc.

The 7.2-hectare residential component has also been delayed. Units in the first two towers were supposed to have been turned over to owners in 2020.

Leonora P. Gutierrez, Suntrust senior assistant vice-president for regional operations, said the new target date for delivery to buyers is in 2022.

“Since completion is expected towards the end of the year, turnover will follow in 2022,” Ms. Gutierrez said in an online interview.

The four towers will have a combined 1,260 residential units and commercial spaces on the ground floor.

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