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It is almost too good to be t rue: a Filipina actress, Marife Necesito (see photo), has been plucked from rel ative obscurity to star in an international film with Michelle Williams and Gae l Garcia Bernal. "Mammoth," written and directed by Swedish wunderkind Lukas Mo odysson, was shot in New York, Sweden, Thailand and the Philippines. With Marif e in the photo at the film's press conference in Sweden are Sophie Nyweide, Mic helle Williams, director Lukas Moodysson and Gael Garcia Bernal. Sounding humble in our interview via e-mail, Marife peppered every sentence wit h "po" -- we felt like we were being addressed by Nora Aunor. For brevityâs sak e, we deleted all the "pos" in Marifeâs answers in our interview which appears in our column. Read her account of how she landed the role -- it's a fascinatin g story.

PARK CITY, Utah--Robert Redford welcomed the opening night crowd of Sundance 20 08 last night (Thursday) with an extemporaneous speech. The theme of change was on the mind of Sundance Institute's founder, who took o ver this festival in the late 1980s. He told the crowd before Colin Farrell's d ark comedy, "In Bruges," began: "Artists are really agents of change. They are the first responders. They document change as it is occurring in the world arou nd us." Editor's note: Photo by Ruben V. Nepales

FILIPINO thespians Marife Necesito and Martin de los Santos join Gael Garcia Be rnal, the star of such acclaimed films as "Babel," "The Motorcycle Diaries," "Y tu Mama Tambien" and "Amores Perros," and Michelle Williams ("Brokeback Mounta in") in a movie being filmed in Subic and Morong. In the film titled "Mammoth," Marife plays the nanny of Gael and Michelleâs chi ld. The story involves Gael's character, a successful New Yorker, who decides t o radically alter his life while he is on vacation in Asia with his family. Mar ife Necesito's credits include a memorable performance in Lav Diaz's "Ebolusyon ng Isang Pamilyang Pilipino." Martin de los Santos was in the movie, "Mga Mata ni Anghelita." Other Pinoys working in the Philippine segment of the shoot are Oli Laperal Jr. , line producer; Awel Galang, production manager; Julie Ysla, casting manager; Criz Soriano and Elmer Santos, location managers; and Tess Marin, production co ordinator. "Mammoth" is the first English language film of Swedish director Lukas Moodysso n, who has several noteworthy films to his credit. Gael, who started acting in his native Mexico, has become an internationally recognized actor. Michelle, wh o split with her "Brokeback Mountain" co-star Heath Ledger this year, earned a Best Supporting Actress nomination for her performance in the film.

MY recent two-part column about our interview with director Francis Coppola elicited a reaction from a reader , specifically on this quote from the filmmaker about making "Apocalypse Now," his landmark Vietnam War film in the Philippines: "I'm thrilled that we did all that in the Philippines. I'm grateful that we did nât lose lives because, as I think back, what we did was far more dangerous: We were up in helicopters flying around. The Filipino people were generous and wo rked so hard for us! We did that dangerous production with honor, so I'm gratef ul. Salamat po!" Rene Ontal, whose e-mail address is rgontal04@yahoo.com and who describes himself as a "writer and fi lmmaker" with a day job as a "media specialist for the City University of New Y ork," wrote: "Mr. Coppola evidently purged the deaths of several Ifugao extras from his consciousness. Playing Montagnard tribesmen, they were crushed to deat h when the Kurtz temple set collapsed during a typhoon. They went unlamented as well in 'Hearts of Darkness: A Filmmaker's Apocalypse,' his wife Eleanor's doc umentary on the making of the film. "As 'apocalyptic' as the shoot was for the filmmaker, I suspect he wouldn't wan t to trade places with the communities affected by his film. Pagsanjan is home to a thriving child prostitution trade which some of his crew members are alleg ed to have engendered. Please see Greta Aiyu Niu's study below in Continuum, a media studies journal at UH (University of Hawaii): Easy_Money_in _Male_Prostitution__An_Imperialist_ Apocalypse_Now_in_the_Philippines.pdf "The Luzon villagers and townspeople were affected by the Philippine military's counterinsurgency campaign in the '70s; did Mr. Coppola consider the dismal an d well-publicized human rights record of the Philippine military before funding and maintaining its helicopters? "When Mr. Coppola proclaimed 'This (film) is not about Vietnam. It is Vietnam,' I doubt he had any idea how tragically accurate that statement was. As a film buff, I will always be enthralled by 'Apocalypse Now.' But as a Filipino-Americ an, the poisonous legacy his film left behind has always struck me as metaphor for the obliterated narratives, such as the Philippine-American War, which haun ts US-Philippine relations. "In the US film school of my dreams, a history of the film's creation would anc hor an ethics class on location shooting in the developing world. It should sta nd as an object lesson on how one Western filmmaker's artistic struggle trigger ed a literal, moral and still-reverberating apocalypse in his host country. I w ould be interested to hear if others have their own perspectives on the 'Apocal ypse' shoot."

THE COLORFUL, versatile actor Bernardo Bernardo was so quotable in my Q and A w ith him via e-mail that my recent column on him ran in two parts. Despite the two-part space devoted to BB, who just finished the LA premiere engagement of the play âThe Romance of Magno Rubi oâ (with a wonderful cast that includes Ramon de Ocampo, Paolo Montalban, Arthu r Acuña and Jojo Gonzalez), we still have some quotable quotes left from our i nterview. So we are sharing some of the Q and A segments which did not get prin ted due to space constraints. And here's a photo of Bernardo Bernardo (standing) with Ramon de Ocampo in "The Romance of Magno Rubio" courtesy of Matt Zugale. A lot of Filipinos in the US remember you fondly from the period when t hey were still living back home. They saw you in the movies, TV shows and plays . Most people smile when they recognize you. But some have probably mistaken yo u for someone else or have forgotten your name. What have been your humorous ex periences in this regard? With or without Alzheimerâs, people do tend to forget. So, I either understand. Or, forget. The elitist theater life gave me my creative chops and credibility, but it was the mass-targeted TV sitcom that made me a household name for a while, through âHome Along Da Riles,â and the reflected unsurpassable star magnetism of the li ving legend, Dolphy. My arched eyebrows and whisker-capped Bardot pout were familiar emblems of Kevi n Cosmeâs swishy, snarky arch-nemesis Steve Carpio for 10 years (with regular r eplays on TFC global cable up to now). Still, people would mistake me for: Pasa y Cityâs Councilor Du Jour Justo C. Justo (gay, moustache, double name -- Bingo !... âKonsehal!!!â). Worse, in a very public setting in the US, like a church, maybe; someone would say, very LOUD, without any malice (with a resounding slap on my shoulder): âHo oooy!!! Kilala kita! Ikaw yung BAKLA!!!... sa TV! Ano ngaâng pangalan mo?!â What have been the most memorable incidents so far, on and off the stag e in your performances of âThe Romance of Magno Rubioâ? Actors get to be very territorial. When I did the Chicago Victory Gardens Theat re run, I auditioned and was given solos for both Mike Velardeâs âIkawâ and Fab ian Obispoâs âYouâre Not From,â and did obligatory chorus parts for âAko Poây P ilipino.â The winds shifted. For the Off-Broadway revival, Paolo was given âIkawâ and Ramon did âYouâre Not From.â I was designated chorus and assigned to sing falsetto (which I hated!) a nd I had to learn to play the freakinâ mandolin! You can say, I was not a very happy camper. It was a damp late spring in New Yo rk and I was living in a friendâs hallway in Elmhurst (grappling with noise, co ckroaches and mice) and had to walk, take a bus and a train, transfer, then wal k again, to and from rehearsals lugging my rehearsal bag and the mandolin. Every day. So, there I was during crash mandolin sessions with Fabian Obispo, gingerly hol ding this stringed instrument, saying, âAlright, Iâll take it home but Iâm not going to learn it.â In the meantime, Paolo was learning to play the harmonica b eautifully and improvising with virtuosic skill on the mandolin while Ramon was channeling his inner Andres Segovia, evoking wondrous sounds from his guitar! And I couldnât even get a decent note out of the plucking mandolin! Finally, with dogged determination, I triumphantly learned to play my mandolin part. We were all happy and surprised. End of story? Not quite. During the tech nical run, I realized that I was positioned in a dark spot where, without my ey eglasses, I could not see the strings! The saga continued. The unintentionally funny incidents? Donât tell anyone. Ramon de Ocampo is a health buff to the extreme. At one time during the run, Ramon had a high colonic prior to a show. Uh-uh. And somehow i t made him air-headed. For the first time ever, he was delivering his memorable monologues with a touc h of Alzheimerâs! And in a shadow scene highlight of the play where I mouth his lines (lip-synch), offstage people were stifling their laughter at my hopeless ly rattled expression, my blabbering lips chasing in a tremulous twist after Ra monâs on-the-spot monologue changes! Now, I know why they call it a HIGH colonic! In fairness to Ramon, he is known for his razor sharp memory. He knows everybod yâs lines. Out of the corner of my eye, during line rehearsals, I would see him mouthing the lines being delivered and I pretend not to notice. He gets really , really impatient when people flub their lines. At one time, during a show, he delivered my lines to me! The expression on his face when he realized what he was doing was priceless. Photo by Matt Zugale

JOAQUIN PHOENIX, one of the finest actors of his generation, has always marched to a different drummer. But it still came as a bit of surprise to hear him tell us in a recent intervie w that he checks his e-mail only once a month. In this day and age, that's a sh ocker to most people who virtually sleep with their BlackBerry. But this is pro bably why Joaquin has stayed refreshingly different from his colleagues. The actor, who stars in the drama, "Reservation Road," admitted in a talk at th e Waldorf-Astoria Hotel in New York: "I'm pretty computer illiterate. I do e-ma il but only occasionally, like once a month. But of course, the Internet is a g reat tool for research. I don't know what actors did 15 years ago. I don't know if I could go to a library and spend that much time researching. Iâm very fort unate to be in this time as an actor because we have the Internet as a great re search tool." Joaquin revealed that he's "not a big reader" in general. "I read scripts and o n whatever research I have to do," he explained. "I have this problem -- I supp ose it's why I'm an actor. When I start reading a book, I end up just going off on these fantasies where I take the character somewhere completely different. I have to go back three pages because I was inventing this other fantasy. I get stimulated by a book but reading doesn't let me focus on staying with the book . I just start wanting to invent other things."

DIRECTOR Quentin Tarantino must like the barong given to him on his recent visit to the Philippines . The innovative filmmaker wore the barong at the premiere of his film, "Death Pr oof," in Dublin, Ireland. He paired the Philippines' national shirt with black and white athletic pants, the unusual combo he came up with when he received th e Lifetime Achievement Award of the Cinemanila Film Festival from President Glo ria Macapagal-Arroyo in Malacañang, as shown in this file photo. Quentin's pants were drenched when he was forced to ditch his flood-struck limo and ride a pedicab to Malacañang amid heavy rain. So he had to change into at hletic pants before receiving the award from GMA. The ensemble must be comfortable -- and he must have enjoyed his stay in the Ph ilippines so much (he is a walking encyclopedia of the films of such Pinoy dire ctors as Cirio H. Santiago and Eddie Romero) that he decided to bring a touch o f Pinas all the way to Ireland. Editor's note: File photo showing President Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo and Que ntin Tarantino at the Malacañang Palace in Manila courtesy of Agence France-Pr esse/Malacañang-PCPO