The annual Cinema One Originals festival is just around the corner in the Philippines and by far - BY FAR - the film that I am most curious about in this year's line up is Phyllis Grande's documentary Haunted: A Last Visit To The Red House.
The trailer for this one is recently arrived and it makes for fascinating viewing. Grande takes the structure of a horror film with her crew exploring the urban legends of a ruined building out in a remote location. It's a crumbling and desolate place and it's no surprise at all to learn of persistent rumors of hauntings on the site. And then Grande pulls the rug out by getting to the true history of the place, used during World War II as a location for so called Comfort Women - in real life women forced in to sexual slavery - to service Japanese soldiers during their occupation of the country.
Though this is just a trailer, obviously, the juxtaposition of the cinematic language of horror with the real life horrors of what actually went on in this building is absolutely masterful. This has the potential to be a truly powerful and important piece of work. Take a look at the trailer - English subtitles included - below.