ANIMA pledges to create award-winning content in the entertainment industry
Erik Matti’s On the Job: The Missing 8 had a screening at the Cultural Center of the Philippines (CCP) last month as part of the WAGI! Celebration of Filipino Excellence.
The Missing 8 centers on the media particularly a corrupt reporter and the investigation of unsolved disappearances. Now available on HBO Max in Northern America and Europe, the crime thriller premiered at the 78th Venice International Film Festival where John Arcilla won the Volpi Cup for Best Actor.
First awarded in 1932, it honored Count Giuseppe Volpi di Misurata, the founder of the Venice Film Festival. How important is the Volpi Cup? “General public opinion does not know that Copa Volpi is practically another Oscar,” says Hon. Marco Clemente, the Italian ambassador to the Philippines. “It is important to know how prestigious this award is for Mr. Arcilla.”
“Can I just mention some of the actors who won the Copa Volpi in the past?” he says. “Leslie Howard, Joseph Cotten, Jean Gabin, Fredric March, Alec Guinness, James Stewart, Toshiro Mifune, Burt Lancaster, Albert Finney, Gerard Depardieu, Marcello Mastroianni, Jack Lemmon, Liam Neeson, Sean Penn, Javier Bardem, Ben Affleck, Brad Pitt, Colin Firth, Adam Driver, Willem Dafoe, and John Arcilla!”
Ernest Cu, president and CEO of Globe, announced that Globe Studios is now known as ANIMA, partnering to be a strong ally of Filipino film creators. It has supported Birdshot, Goyo: Ang Batang Heneral, Hintayan ng Langit, Dead Kids, Fan Girl, Ang Pagbabalik ng Kwago, and Leonor Will Never Die, most are acclaimed in local and international film festivals.
“OTJ: The Missing 8 is another brilliant example of how ready Filipinos are for the bigger audience,” says the MBA graduate from the J.L. Kellogg Graduate School of Management at Northwestern University. “Our commitment to the Filipino film industry goes beyond producing topnotch films, as we also encourage our customers to fight against piracy and consume content only from legitimate sources.”
In our chat with Quark Henares, the executive director/head of ANIMA, he reveals, “As the studio grew and we created more challenging and mature content, it made sense to spin off from the mother telco.”
“We're part of a whole entertainment ecosystem now called KROMA, which creates everything from music (Paradise Rising), to live events (LiveMNL), to publishing (Wonder) to even distribution (Upstream).”
There is so much talent in our local creators that the goal is to give them opportunities and empower them. “We know we can be world-class, and we have been,” muses Quark. “We just need to take chances on creators more.”
There are exciting projects coming up for ANIMA. “Right now in the pipeline we have Tonet Jadaone’s spinoff of Hintayan ng Langit, entitled Simula sa Gitna,” says Quark. A reality series with One Championship is in the works. Two movies will be shooting soon, Missed Connections by first-time director Jelise Chung and The Break App by JP Habac.
ANIMA will continue Globe Studios' mission, and maybe even taking it up a notch. “One of the great things about not being tied to any brand is we can experiment more, build our image differently, so expect the same world-class content but in a variety of different mediums and genres,” shares Quark.