The market eats its own: How a UP Visayas student turned Iloilo’s palengke into a horror film

PUREGOLD CINEPANALO

‘Kanibal,’ a 16-minute Hiligaynon short film written and directed by Michael Baylon, turns body horror into a commentary on the redevelopment of an Iloilo City public market

There is a shot in Kanibal that looks like nothing at all until you notice it. A woman in an orange apron works her stall. Slabs of pork hang from hooks above her head. Taped to the post behind her is a prayer card to St. Martha, patron of cooks and servants. On her chest, printed across a white campaign shirt, is the smiling face of the mayor she voted for.

By the end of the film, the meat and the woman will be difficult to tell apart.

Kanibal is a 16-minute-and-52-second Hiligaynon short film written and directed by Michael A. Baylon, a Communication and Media Studies student at the University of the Philippines Visayas. It is his debut as a director. It is also one of 20 shorts selected for the Puregold CinePanalo Film Festival 2026, each carrying a P200,000 production grant, screening in the Shorts Category (Set A) when the festival runs from September 23 to October 4 across Gateway Cineplex 18, TriNoma, Fairview Terraces, Ayala Malls Feliz, Ayala Malls Circuit, Ayala Malls Manila Bay, and Market! Market!

The premise is deceptively small. Lea (Rowen Jean Ledesma, in her introducing credit) is a meat vendor who runs her stall with her daughter Anne (Lia Sophia Sajonia) underfoot, in a public market loud with the ordinary business of a town buying and selling. One morning, her neighbor at the next stall, Anecita (Ma. Lourdes Maculada), brings news: Mayor Lin (Roselle Lao) is coming to visit. Lea has been a diehard supporter since the campaign. She is thrilled. She prepares a cut of meat as a gift.