THE MESSAGE. BRINGING INTO FOCUS FILIPINO PRESENCE IN AUSTRALIA
www.kalatas.com.au | Volume 6 Number 4 | JANUARY 2016
ENTERTAINMENT
Robertino with co-director Melissa Johnson
Robertino on the Oscars shortlist:
‘Nothing more than a fantasy…’
Now it gets serious. What started as a project for YouTube lands in the
shortlist for the Short Animation category of the 88th Academy Awards.
By Titus Filio
Robertino Zambrano is starting the
year with a bang. More than enjoying
lighting up fireworks in their ancestral
home in Malabon, the young Fil-Aussie director is in the limelight. Just before 2015 ended, he had received the big
news to surprise him: his collaborative
project 'Love in the Time of March Madness' has made it to the shortlist in the
Academy Awards.
Being in the shortlist means he's getting close to a nomination. His is one
of just ten animated films chosen from
a field of 60 qualifiers, a field that qualified from thousands of entries from
around the world.
It's no joke to have one's name and
work published in an Oscars shortlist.
"I didn't believe it at first. When I realised the news was real, the excitement
was unbearable, and it kept me and my
co-director Melissa Johnson buzzing for
a few weeks," Robertino told Ang Kalatas via email just after an all-night party
with friends and relatives in their ancestral home in Malabon.
"This film was truly a 'homebrew'
project. So the idea of getting shortlisted
was nothing more than a fantasy."
Narrated (and co-produced and codirected) by the USA's Melissa Johnson,
'Love in the time of March Madness' is
a 9-minute animated short film based on
Melissa's own life story.
It was written by Melissa and draws
from her unique and unusual life vantage point as a tall woman on the dating
scene. After hitting 6'4" in the 8th grade
and becoming a college basketball star,
the film follows her hilarious and awkward misadventures in romance as she
dates shorter men and gets cheered or
jeered wherever she goes.
Powerful storytelling and narration is brought to life by Australian animators KAPWA Studioworks which
used a combination of traditional 2D
animation techniques, hand generated
textures and digital 2D and 3D animation techniques. The result is a stunning
frame-by-frame oil paint-like technique
giving the short an amazing hand-made
look and feel.
In an interview with the Sydney
Morning Herald, Robertino revealed that
"Love in the Time…" was supposed to
be a six-month YouTube project. But "a
few months into the development stages,
I said to Melissa, 'Let's just have a crack
at doing this properly,'" he said.
The six-month project turned into a
three-year project and getting the honour
to be screened in over a dozen major international film festivals.
The Oscars shortlist is the latest in a
long list of awards and accolades for the
short film. These include: Tribeca Film
Festival (Best Online Short Film), Abu
Dhabi Film Festival (Winner, Best Short
Documentary), Sydney Underground
Film Festival (Winner, Audience Choice
Award), among others.
Blazing with honesty and dark
humour, LOVE IN THE TIME OF
MARCH MADNESS is a 'tall short'
– a true story that dips into Melissa's
thoughts and memories and is all about
embracing difference.
Melissa Johnson describes it best
when she says: "After all, we don't see
other people the way that they are, we
see them the way that we are."
Melissa Johnson is a writer and filmmaker living in Venice, California.
known for 'Brittney Griner: LIFESIZE' a
documentary currently airing on ESPN.
Robertino was born in the Philippines. He studied design at the University of Technology in Sydney and soon focused on animation.
His family grew up in Malabon. His
father originally hails from Ilocos Norte
while his mother (Martinez) is originally
from Romblon.
He was in the Philippines during the
holidays to take time off a very busy year
travelling around Cebu, and up north in
the Mountain Province. He also spent
time in Manila to link with the Filipino
film community.
Looking to a great year ahead, the
big date to wait for Robertino is January 14 when the Academy Awards an-
nounces the five official nominees. For
Robertino, he said that landing in the
shortlist was al &VG