Yield

“Yield” is an ethnographic inquiry done over a period of five years, documenting the lives of nine children living in dire Third World conditions. Stonecutters April, Ariel, and Rommel are siblings living off selling rocks they hack off a menacing mountain. Jomar scours the ocean silt for gold. Edralen and Jason tend to and transport agricultural products. With the addition of other kids, the definition of labor is expounded to include another meaning: labor as part of the creation and eventual decline of life.

It is a self-reflexive study on the inherent dilemma of representation as manipulation in documentary film. In belaboring child labor for an extended period, representing the exploited, itself, is exploitation. Yield is an attempt to address this impasse, stripping the gaze off its fetishization of poverty. The brutal editing does not linger to capture drama. It forges on in its brisk parade of shots, seeking answer in the shuffling and reshuffling of the pattern of lack, as it seeks solace in the suture of youth struggles.

And as if in apology for representing the vulnerability of the exploited, it meanders time and again-gazing a little longer at greens growing or a healed child swimming against the river current-to find breaks on the solid wall of imagery that renders perceptible a system that has and will never yield, hoping perhaps to find a crack unto which it can whisper silent prayers for the dear and damned.

Directed by Toshihiko Uriu and Victor Delotavo Tagaro

Awards

Best Documentary, Gawad Urian Awards 2018 and FAMAS Awards 2018

Screenings

Nation in Visions Vol. 1

December 10, Tuesday | 2:00 PM | UPFI Film Center – Cine Adarna
December 14, Saturday | 3:00 PM | Center, Sitio San Roque, Quezon City
December 15, Sunday | 6:00 PM | Tempo Shelter, Sitio San Roque, Quezon City
December 15, Sunday | 3:00 PM | Cinema Centenario

Cinemalaya 2018 DOKYU Section

August 10, 2018 | Friday, 12:45pm
CCP Dream Theater