TAGA, which means ‘From’ in Tagalog, was born out of the existential urge that propels people to seek the truth in far-flung places… and the cultural conflict that such journeys can create.

The story follows Vivi, a ‘third culture’ Filipina-American, who travels to the rural mountains of Luzon hoping to understand the essence of her origins. Unfortunately, she becomes immersed with the wrong group of Western volunteers who have little respect for the indigenous customs. They trample over tradition on their quest to save the world, and must face the monstrous repercussions of their ignorance. 

Like our hero Vivi, I’ve sought out the Motherland on quests to understand my mixed identity. Growing up cloistered in a tiny mountain town in America, far from my mother’s large, boisterous Filipino family, I’ve always felt like an alien, far away from the place where I might make sense. Like many Asian immigrants, my mother fixated on assimilating at all costs, repressing her culture and past for safety. She wanted to protect herself, and me, from being targeted as Other in our white, conservative village, but it didn’t work. We were still Other, just enshrouded by a nebulous gray fog, slowly sinking without a tangible history or culture to hold on to. 

Even as an adult, something of this fog still lurks inside me, a question mark at the soul level. I’ve traveled all over the world trying to disperse it, yet there is something inside that remains unanswerable. When I travel to the Philippines, I want to feel whether my body awakens on a cellular level, to know that somewhere I belong. I want to find some nuggets of the essential culture, something that existed before the waves of armies, traders, Colonial invaders altered everything. But the truth is I am a foreigner. The authenticity and belonging I seek might never be open to me. It might be uttered in an ancient language that my brain has never molded to hear. As a traveler my presence is subtly influencing the very culture I’m seeking, which is also pushing, pulling, and acting on me. And that’s terrifying.

There are a lot of ethical nuances to global travel. It is precious, holy, evil, and inevitable. The perfect playground for Horror. Which brings me to the other inspiration for Taga, an experience that took place elsewhere in the world. After college, I wandered across Africa, backpacking solo overland, in search of authentic experiences. I tried to avoid the places curated for tourists, instead I often ended up volunteering at farms, reserves, and small local organizations. In Madagascar, I found an eco-reserve that on paper seemed perfect - they claimed to work hand in hand with the local indigenous tribe, but the reality on the ground was quite different. A toxic war had formed between the locals and the Europeans who ran the reserve. The westerners demonized the tribe, blamed them for every random thing that went wrong. Because of this treatment, the locals believed the leader of the reserve to be a white warlock, who had brought a curse upon them and the land. As problem after problem escalated the conflict, it seemed as if there was something supernatural drawing both sides into this spiral of darkness and chaos. I was trying to travel gently, with an open-heart, to find family in strangers, a truth apart from the western capitalist mores that poorly answered ‘how best to live’. Now I was trapped, contributing to a neo-colonial cult of ‘western aid’. Afraid that this spiral might end in violence, I ran away. I’ve been trying to understand that experience ever since. How can such pure intentions as wanting to ‘save the world’ and ‘revive a forest lead to such horror?

Taga, the short film/ proof of concept, is a pared down attempt to use horror to begin to talk about the dark side of travel, culture clash, and a certain brand of neo-colonial voluntourism. The supernatural evil has been simplified to a monster born of folklore - inspired by the Filipino door-knocking entity, the Nangangatok. Most horror films about travel tend to demonize ‘the Other’, making the western travelers the heroes and victims of the monstrous strangers. To me the true horror is brought about by the western saviors, imposing their will upon others, ignorant of the stories they wander into, the monsters they create or incite. The indigenous Kalinga Filipinos in Taga are not the antagonists, nor are they the magical shamans who save the foreigners; they are people who have dealt with their demons long before the volunteers arrived. Yet if the travelers are open and perceptive enough, they could learn from the locals, and possibly save themselves from the feasting darkness. Or not.