Taon Noong Ako’y Anak Sa Labas (Years When I Was a Child Outside)

John Torres’ Taon noong ako’y anak sa labas (Years When I Was a Child Outside, 2008) starts out with the key event described in the film’s title: the revelation that his father had another family, sired three children that neither Torres nor his mother knew anything about.

It’s a traumatic enough an event for any family to endure; for Torres it was reason enough to leave home and try make sense of his life not through discussion, or diary-writing, or any kind of easy, tension-relieving dramaturgy (yelling at his father, or at the stars or something), but through some kind of cinematic digestion–taking bits and pieces of his life into himself, meditating over them for a time, then regurgitating them, transformed, on the big screen.

(Note: The film was shown in the 38th Rotterdam International Film Festival, the 38th Berlinale’s International Forum on New Cinema, and the 21st Singapore International Film Festival.

Director: John Torres
Stars: Errol Balcos, Mario Lim, Ian Lomongo, Donna Miranda, Chico Pace, Nympha Torres, Rodolfo Torres, Topper Torres