Khavn

Black satire about a super-polite Filippino child who literally loses his head.

An improvised homage to the great silent slapstick tradition in which two brothers want each other's blood.

Piling plays soccer with a tin can through the slums of Manila. A new Maradona?

Not free of violence and sex. And nor is it free of madness, because where else would you find a family that sits down to a meal of soil three times a day? No, not even in the Philippines. But that's what it all comes down to.

A tramp from Manila takes over the life of the driver after a car accident.

What makes a man castrate himself? With colleague director Lav Diaz in the role of the bleeding man.

Unusual film verison of the prize-winning book by Norman Wilwayco.

Little Ali is more of a world champion at crying than the boxing champ he wants to be.

A kid playing naked on the beach. One calls it a family film, the other calls it child pornography.

A group of tribal leaders from the jungle search the city like a hard rock band. Or is it a rock group looking for the jungle? The filmmaker was arrested for the film, together with his half naked kings. Funny, unpolished, musical and (hence) also a little bit political.

Part of a satirical series about so-called super heroes. Not really heart-breakers.

Disorderly film maker restrains himself briefly to record the naked truth. There are people who have two eat rubbish. That's how the world is.

Yes, that may sound spectacular, that porn; but remember it's satire.

Slim and cheerful boys.They seem to be playing rugby without a care. Maybe because they don't have anything to worry about. Just one of the slums in the Philippines. A documentary doesn't need to be long. This one already says more than enough.

Mini-film about superman in love.

From a series of humorous vignettes about literal antiheroes.

From a series of nine. They also have corny humour in the Philippines.

From a simultaneously pointed and corny series about wretched superheroes.

A toilet concert. Tinker, tailor, soldier... Even super heroes have too sometimes, but they make music on the spot.

Very active full-length film maker also turns out to operate well on the short track. A handful of people are basically waiting for nothing. You have to be able to do that too. A film about making virtually nothing.

A little boy is beaten out of the house and meets a toy comrade in a deserted lighthouse dwelling. Exciting.

Short film poem. A woman walks along a military fence. The historic waterway remains out of reach.

A video wants to be a film, as the world’s second biggest oil spill just happened in the heart of the filmmaker.

Yes, a cinema to be proud of, yet the cheer is full of irony. The history of Filipino film isn’t treated with so much respect.

Filmmaker friend demolishes the masterpiece Batang West Side by Lav Diaz. Diaz looked at it and approved.

As short as a commercial and sad as a poem. As funny as a short film by Khavn. Not political. Or is it?

Filmmaker moved to the Philippine island of Guimaras for a major oil disaster. He found a major storyteller. Without teeth and without stopping.

Genuine punk on the soundtrack. A catchy picture of a slum district on the coast near Manila. Black & white shots edited in an equally catchy rhythm. Or how an authentic picture of little boys who literally live on and from rubbish can be edited. Lust for life.

Basically an artist is also a terrorist, the protagonist thinks in an unguarded moment. And if he is a terrorist after all, then he might just as well be one. Not an instant product, but an experimental feature in which diary material is brought together to form an intriguing puzzle.

The muddy scene outside a shop on a tropical rain day.

Tempestuous film maker held his breath for once and made an almost matter-of-fact portrait of several inhabitants of a decaying Filipino apartment district. Fake document with a Brazilian lightness.

A film that openly describes the childhood of the film maker and his father who also had children outside their family. The frankness is cloaked by a series of interpretations and poetic reflections. The maker analyses his own diary.

Yes it's quite a sit. And it's also in black-and-white. Didn't you hear it was very slow? This film asks for a certain commitment, but offers a lot in return. This Filipino master shares his insights and feelings with you. His sorrow. A lesson in life for the price of a cinema ticket.

Maybe animal lovers should come in ten minutes too late. Yet the ritual slaughter of a young water buffalo is a powerful start to a sombre and nightmarish film about the Passion of Christ. No, it doesn't look like that are the film. This Christ has no idea either.

It's not his first or only short film, but a short film by the master of the extremely long film is exceptional. Poetic and political.

It made the censors in the Philippines stutter. The filmmaker, in his vision of the Apocalypse as experienced by three women locked in a ghostly house, was not only inspired by horror, but also by porn films. You have been warned.

Musical and experimental film maker Khavn noticed that Filipino film makers are highly regarded in Cameroon - thanks to a popular Filipino soap series. He was grateful to exploit this as he made his portrait of this country. And he also wrote some real 'soap' into his story.

Adaptation of the poem Mi ultimo adiós (My Last Goodbye) by Jose Rizal (1896): 'On the field of battle, 'mid the frenzy of fight / Others have given their lives, without doubt or heed'.

Filipino author/musician/filmmaker Khavn (Madonna doesn't need a surname either) has a reputation for wild films. However, this balanced, even minimalist work demonstrates his wide range. With a commander on a water buffalo, but also a roaming grand piano.

The Son of God is a dwarf. He has a blonde wig and allows himself to be carried around by Filipinos. Two filmmakers, one Filipino and one Danish, follow him at first, but end up largely following each other. A kind of documentary. A glimpse from the outside and at the same time from within.

Mondo Cane is the legendary and cruel shockumentary by Gualtiero Jacopetti. Khavn sees his own Mondo in Manila. Jacopetti was an outsider; Khavn is a participant. The secret of Khavn is that he shows poverty and injustice in an almost cheerful way, making it even more awkward.

Comedy about child abuse. Looks like an NGO video about the Philippines, but the local director turns the tables with devilish delight.

Anyone lulled by Khavn's strikingly accessible Mondomanila is in for a shock. The Filipino film beast punishes his audience here again, just like old times. The form is powerful and avant-gardist and the subject is self-chastising. Incessantly. Khavn’s red period.

Political realism in an absurdist musical. Everything in this film is based on exaggeration and also on the incomparable reality of the Philippines. The images of the rebellion against the dictator Ferdinand Marcos in 1989 are real; those of future rebellions become increasingly crazy and musical.

As a Filipino variation on The Artist, this is a fictive silent film as well. A supposedly rediscovered masterpiece recounts with considerable visual flair the story of an escaped prisoner who gets hold of a magic camera, and ends up in political skirmishes.

What can a family do if someone disappears in a dictatorship? You can’t go to the police for help or information. Many families were affected in this way by the cruelty of the Marcos dictatorship (1972-1986). The film shows one of them as an example of paradise lost.

Thirteen hours is quite something, and in this case certainly not only for the viewer. Filmmaker-poet-composer Khavn will accompany the film on the piano for its entire duration. A very special show that will easily make the Guinness Book of Records as the longest musical film accompaniment ever.

Whirlwind mix of humour and grotesque violence by the productive Khavn, this time with young kids from the slums of Manila in the leading roles as robbing and murdering gang members with nicknames like Pork Chop, Bull Dog, McAbnormal and Snowman. And a smoking toddler, Day-Old Chick, walking round with a gun in his hand.