MIKHAIL RED is one of our youngest directors at 30 and yet, he already has quite an impressive filmography.
He first got international acclaim for his film, “Birdshot”, in 2016 when he was only 24.
Since then, he has come up with hit horror flicks like “Eerie” and “Block Z”, and he directed the first original Pinoy film for Netflix, “Deadkids”.
He was obviously influenced by his dad, Raymond Red, whose short film won the Palme D’or in Cannes in 2000.
Mik was only 15 when he formally started filmmaking and came up with short films that won awards in filmfests abroad.
He was 21 when he helmed his first full length film for the 2013 Cinemalaya, “Rekorder”, about film piracy.
His last work was the indie film, “Arisaka”, which just won for Mon Confiado the best supporting actor award in the recent Eddy Awards.
And now, he has a new mainstream movie, “Deleter”, called a techno-horror flick as its about content moderators who filter video footage before they are released on the internet.
It is the only horror entry in the coming Metro-Manila Filmfest, so it’s predicted to be a topgrosser as horror movies usually make a killing at the filmfest box office. What can he say about this?
“Well, we’re hoping na sana, magkatotoo,” he says. “Let’s pray that moviegoers will really come back to watch movies in actual theaters during this film festival.”
Does “Deleter” have a chance to win awards, like Nadine Lustre who is said to be impressive in the lead role of Lyra, a content moderator who gets haunted by apparitions?
“We can only hope na sana nga, mapansin. But it’s difficult to say as we have not seen the other entries.
"We’re sure the other directors and actors also did their best. Mahirap mag-compare kasi iba-iba ang genre.
"Let’s just pray na lahat ng entries, panoorin ng viewers.”
He says he didn’t make “Deleter” with the intention of joining the filmfest.
“We were surprised nang ipasok ito ng Viva sa festival and we’re so happy when we became an official entry.
"I think nakita nila yung kakaibang combination ng new concept about content moderators in a genre film at yung young cast.
"What happened is we just want to make a good horror movie and sinuwerteng mapapanood ito ngayon ng mas maraming tao during the filmfest.”
Is there really a job called content moderator or he just invented it for the film?
“I’ve read about them before in Facebook, then there were articles written about it. Sometimes you wonder why nade-delete ang post mo sa internet and who makes the decision to delete it.
"Then I saw a documentary about it so my interest and fascination for this grew and grew.
"Parang this job is creepy, so weird and clandestine. Parang very underground type of occupation.
"Tapos, during the pandemic, andaming restrictions, so I thought of making a film about a content moderator.”
“Deleter” is focused on the story of Nadine Lustre as Lyra, a content moderator who is quiet, detached, keeping to herself because she has a traumatic past which she wants to delete in her own memory.
“Bagay sa kanya ang job ng content moderator kasi very contained ito. But she soon realizes that it’s not that easy to delete things from your past.
"Something bad happens in their company, and whether she likes it or not, she will get involved in it.
"Someone died and as the blurb in the poster said ‘you cannot delete the dead’. That’s where all the scary things will come in and we guarantee you that we will give you a good scare.”
Also in the movie are Louise de los Reyes, McCoy de Leon and Jeffrey Hidalgo. This opens in theaters on Christmas Day.