SQUATTERPUNK
aka ISKWATERPANGK
The best social realist documentary in the Philippines, SQUATTERPUNK is a daring and adventurous film shot in the kind of slum neighbourhood where police protection is rare. The film, energetic and funny in a place that is supposed to be depressing, does not exactly fit into the social awareness approach of a direct cinema documentary. The score of the film is loud if not deafening. And not in vogue. Director Khavn, the enfant terrible of Filipino cinema, brings us back to the ‘no future’ eighties of authentic anarchic punk. But it is consistent in its style of black-and-white images and its rhythmic montage that is clearly driven by the music-based sound track. Compared to the ironic collage way of working in most of Khavn’s other films, this one is crystal clear if not neat. Well, only in comparison with his other sometimes exuberant experiments. By any other standard, it is a wild and pulsating film. SQUATTERPUNK shows something of life in the slums in a quite special way. It shows how poor, forgotten and ignored children can have a good time. Playing and swimming in rotting garbage can apparently be fun. So it is not the cliché image of tears in a child’s eyes that makes us aware of this disgraceful situation but the vitality and pleasure of the protagonists. In addition, maybe even stronger than pity, this pleasure enforces the inevitable message: no future. (Gertjan Zuilhof, Rotterdam International Film Festival)
GALLERY
Tweaking the poverty documentaries omnipresent in festival circles, SQUATTERPUNK turns its camera on a group of children living in a squalid Manila slum. Unlike most poverty documentaries, the film is less concerned (or not concerned at all, actually) with making any points about the hopelessness of their condition, but instead follows the kids as they play and walk around like little tough guys, complete with Mohawks and a fuck-you attitude. (Jason Sanders, Filmmaker Magazine & Cinemascope Magazine)
SQUATTERPUNK wants it viewers to be prepared for a feature-length music video quite unlike anything MTV is likely to broadcast. Shot in black-and-white to relentless punk rock energy, its "stars" are squatter kids living off the waste of Manila. Diving into dark waters teeming with refuse and scavenging for food, the nameless next generation still make time to shave their heads Mohawk style and bang madly on makeshift drums or strum beaten up guitars. (Philip Cheah, Singapore International Film Festival)
A rollicking ride into the depths of poverty-inspired despair, with that distinctly Philippine sense of hope, rising above the regular smell of garbage, swinging and slamming with joyous riot music. This is Khavn returning to the bare, essential, and simply punk. (Joel Toledo, Bridport Prize Winner for Poetry)
Despite the crude, violent, exploitative connotations of its title, SQUATTERPUNK casts a tenderly poetic eye at the squalor of Philippine society. (Lourd De Veyra, Palanca Awardee for Essay)
Pinoy Punk Rock is the music that reflects the lively and chaotic world of the urban poor in an independent masterpiece titled SQUATTERPUNK by the internationally award-winning director Khavn. (Jude Bautista, Manila Times)
