Récompenses

For analyzing the problems of the present day Philippine society through a simple moving story and displaying and outstanding cinematic talent.

In emphatic tones, transported by the personal drama of the two grandmothers, "Lola" illustrates the way life functions in Manila: the police, the courtrooms, the prisons, etc. What is a human life worth in the 21st century? Money in an envelope, handed over in a restaurant.

In Manila, the fates of two grandmothers cross paths: the grandson of one of the women has murdered the grandson of the other. While the victim's grandmother seeks justice and struggles to scratch together money for his funeral, the culprit's grandmother fights to have him freed through an extrajudicial financial agreement. Even through the limits between good and evil, victims and perpetrators are well-defined, both grandmothers are united in their struggle for the survival of their families in everyday life. With a documentary precision, the filmmaker transports us into a context that embraces the reality of death, justice, poverty and the quest for honor.

Tied with Les états nordiques (2005). Unanimously.

For a technically astounding film that captures the grim reality of life in the ghettoes of Manila. The cast of mostly untrained actors was not a handicap, on the contrary, they delivered excellent performances that were emphatic without being sentimental.

For its cinematic structure and portrayal of in-depth relations and basic elements of family in Asian societies.

For offering images of a largely inaccessible world and its rituals.

For its choice to exploit the mechanisms of fiction to analyze contemporary Filipino reality, in a voyage of discovery of the local culture that becomes a lucid, deep study of the first stirrings of a new democracy.