Preceded by short:Anino (Raymond Red, Philippines, 2000): A photographer wanders the city of Manila, first viewing, then feeling, the widening gap between rich and poor, powerful and powerless, and his own position between them. Winner of the Palme d'Or for Best Short Film at the Cannes Film Festival. (12 mins, In Tagalog with English subtitles, Color, 35mm)(Azucena). Contemporary anthropologists insist that we examine a society's cuisine through culturally specific lenses. A cow is revered in India, while its meat is served at a fast-food joint in America. Likewise, one person's pet could be a delicacy of another. When Tomas tells his daughter Lily that her dog is to be served as an appetizer for his coming birthday party, she confronts the local dog-meat vendor Teban and he returns her pet unharmed. An unlikely friendship develops between the aging butcher and the dog-loving teenager. Tomas becomes suspicious of the friendship, and does everything in his hallowed macho power to suppress it. The narrative develops to depict the textures and flavors of the urban slum, fraught with social issues familiar to Philippine cinema: incest, spousal abuse, corruption, and misogyny. Despite melodramatic devices such as gun chases and hysteria, the film's nonchalant treatment of a jarring subject matter leads the viewer to a different experience.- Michael Magnaye