Overdosed Nightmare

Khavn De La Cruz / Philippines / 2008 / International Premiere / 88 min.

synopsis

An avant-garde film, Overdosed Nightmare offers audiences an unsettling, close-up view of a wounded Manila. Rapid decline, nihilism, gangrene, and pus are what characterize the lives of those who live in the Philippines’ capital city. A gang of rat-munching, hood rat delinquents wreak havoc in the streets. A young hooligan shoves a prisoner into a barrel and taunts him with philosophical gobbledygook while one man toys with a poor, crippled man. These micro-stories are later topped by Jesus’ journey to Golgotha. Khavn ruthlessly criticizes the Church and draws attention to the hypocrisy of an institution that wages wars in the name of God and cooperates with dictators. A corrupt president, prisoners, actors, and a crucified Jesus H. Christ all mesh together in this phantasmagorical performance, which features an underlying sociopolitical and philosophical commentary on Filipino society.

biography

Khavn De La Cruz (* 1973), an experimental filmmaker, poet, and musician, is considered the father of Philippine digital filmmaking. In 2002, he founded .MOV, the first digital film festival in the Philippines. He ranks among the most prolific film creators and sits on several festival juries, including for Ji.hlava IDFF, where his films Mondomanila, or: How I Fixed My Hair After a Rather Long Journey (2012), Misericordia: The Last Mystery of Kristo Vampiro (2013), and Filipiniana (2015) were shown.