In Shireen Seno’s opaque but beautiful drama, an eight-year-old Filipina finds a pen she believes responds to people’s feelings
Nervous Translation from the Filipino artist and film-maker Shireen Seno (a former stills photographer for Lav Diaz) is a challenging film for the head and the heart, difficult to decode and to respond to emotionally. The title does not really help: nobody is “nervous” exactly – anxious, concerned, yes – and “translation” doesn’t precisely describe what is going on. But, as a slice of life, as a direct transcription of a child’s-eye view of the world, it is intriguingly and lovingly detailed.
The setting is the Philippines in the late 1980s, just after the Marcos rule. Yael (Jana Agoncillo) is an eight-year-old girl who is alone at home a lot of the time after school before her mum Val (Angge Santos) comes home from a hard day’s work.
Nervous Translation from the Filipino artist and film-maker Shireen Seno (a former stills photographer for Lav Diaz) is a challenging film for the head and the heart, difficult to decode and to respond to emotionally. The title does not really help: nobody is “nervous” exactly – anxious, concerned, yes – and “translation” doesn’t precisely describe what is going on. But, as a slice of life, as a direct transcription of a child’s-eye view of the world, it is intriguingly and lovingly detailed.
The setting is the Philippines in the late 1980s, just after the Marcos rule. Yael (Jana Agoncillo) is an eight-year-old girl who is alone at home a lot of the time after school before her mum Val (Angge Santos) comes home from a hard day’s work.
- 4/4/2019
- by Peter Bradshaw
- The Guardian - Film News
With her first film “Big Boy”, Shireen Seno proved how much she understands children, and particularly their need to get away from the norms grown-ups impose on them. This quality is highlighted even more in “Nervous Translation” which won the Netpac award at Iffr.
“Nervous Translation” is screening at Five Flavours Festival
The film takes place in 1987, a bit after the People Power Revolution that led to the fall of President Marcos and his dictatorship, and revolves around eight-year-old Yael, a shy and distant girl. Her father is away, working in Riyadh, her mother works in a small industry that manufactures shoes, and Yael has to spend a lot of time by herself. During these times, she repeatedly listens to the cassettes her father has recorded for them in an old player that occasionally breaks the tapes, or plays cooking in her mini stove. Her uncle, who is actually her father’s twin,...
“Nervous Translation” is screening at Five Flavours Festival
The film takes place in 1987, a bit after the People Power Revolution that led to the fall of President Marcos and his dictatorship, and revolves around eight-year-old Yael, a shy and distant girl. Her father is away, working in Riyadh, her mother works in a small industry that manufactures shoes, and Yael has to spend a lot of time by herself. During these times, she repeatedly listens to the cassettes her father has recorded for them in an old player that occasionally breaks the tapes, or plays cooking in her mini stove. Her uncle, who is actually her father’s twin,...
- 11/17/2018
- by Panos Kotzathanasis
- AsianMoviePulse
With her first film “Big Boy”, Shireen Seno proved how much she understands children, and particularly their need to get away from the norms grown-ups impose on them. This quality is highlighted even more in “Nervous Translation” which won the Netpac award at Iffr.
“Nervous Translation” is screening at San Diego Asian Film Festival (Sdaff)
The film takes place in 1987, a bit after the People Power Revolution that led to the fall of President Marcos and his dictatorship, and revolves around eight-year-old Yael, a shy and distant girl. Her father is away, working in Riyadh, her mother works in a small industry that manufactures shoes, and Yael has to spend a lot of time by herself. During these times, she repeatedly listens to the cassettes her father has recorded for them in an old player that occasionally breaks the tapes, or plays cooking in her mini stove. Her uncle, who...
“Nervous Translation” is screening at San Diego Asian Film Festival (Sdaff)
The film takes place in 1987, a bit after the People Power Revolution that led to the fall of President Marcos and his dictatorship, and revolves around eight-year-old Yael, a shy and distant girl. Her father is away, working in Riyadh, her mother works in a small industry that manufactures shoes, and Yael has to spend a lot of time by herself. During these times, she repeatedly listens to the cassettes her father has recorded for them in an old player that occasionally breaks the tapes, or plays cooking in her mini stove. Her uncle, who...
- 11/8/2018
- by Panos Kotzathanasis
- AsianMoviePulse
People often say “see the world through the eyes of a child,” acting as if these words are the remedy to cynicism. Somehow this phrase is charged with what we imagine childhood to be: innocence, authenticity, joy and tears (somehow our emotions back then feel purer), wonder, etc. And yet what we often brush aside is how childhood also carries vulnerability, confusion, uncertainty, naiveté. Shireen Seno’s Nervous Translation showcases the balance and interconnectedness of these themes in her layered magical realist take on growing up in the 80s. Yael (Jana Agoncillo) is an 8-year old girl who lives with her mother, Val. She is frequently left alone, coming home to an empty house after school. She usually preoccupies herself by preparing miniature meals...
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- 11/18/2017
- Screen Anarchy
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