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The Philippines' entry to the 86th Academy Awards
World Premiere Cinemalaya Independent Film Festival
Winner, Best Film & Best Director Cinemalaya Independent Film Festival
Official Selection Los Angeles Jewish Film Festival
Official Selection Busan In'l Film Festival
"Espia makes an impressive debut with this gracefully directed, inventively edited look at the plight of Filipino immigrant workers in Israel." - Variety
"Transit is a marvel... tremendous" - Twitch Film
TRANSIT explores the intersecting stories of Filipinos in Tel Aviv when the threat of a law deporting the children of migrant workers looms over their precarious lives. Janet (Adlawan), a domestic worker on an expired visa, struggles to hide her half-Israeli daughter, Yael (Curtis-Smith)—a rebellious teenager caught up in a juvenile romance. Most endangered in the situation is Janet’s four-year old nephew, Joshua (Alvarez), whom Janet and Yael watch over because the boy’s father, Moises (Medina), must work out of town during the week as a caregiver. Joshua is the most vulnerable to the deportation law because he is under the age of five and therefore must be kept hidden otherwise he risks being seen by the immigration authorities, who regularly patrol the neighborhood. The film also explores the life of a young lady, Tina (Cabral), who arrives to start a new life in Israel.
Transit examines what it means to be a family and what it means to be a stranger, within one's home and in a foreign land.
Hannah Espia is an up-and-coming young filmmaker based in Manila, Philippines.
Transit, Espia’s debut feature film, premiered at the Cinemalaya Philippine Independent Film Festival in July 2013 to critical acclaim and won ten awards including Best Picture, Best Director and Audience Choice, heralding Espia as an emerging new voice in Philippine Independent Cinema. Transit will have its International Premiere at the 18th Busan Film Festival under the New Currents Section.
Espia is currently developing her next project #NoOneWillFindUsHere, a creative documentary about the short encounters of long distance lovers.
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