“So ‘yung tatlong periods, 1801 and then, 1942 during World War II or post World War II and the last one is 2023,” shares Mallari director Derick Cabrido.
Piolo Pascual will be playing Juan Severino Mallari, the first and only documented serial killer in the Philippines which happens to be also a priest, in his first horror film to be directed by Derick Cabrido (Purgatoryo, Tuos) and produced by Mentorque Productions of John Bryan Diamante.
“I always appreciate the process of immersing yourself of getting to know your character and trusting your director, trusting the script, trusting the character and I’m always excited to play a part that I know that is not me and playing a character is always a big challenge. I don’t overthink, I go through the journey of each character that I portray. But for this, it’s gonna be really hard but good thing that we’re shooting in three different periods to save time and also for the prosthetics and the locations. It gives me goosebumps but I’ve seen a lot of serial killer docus and films, and like what I said, it’s a privilege for me to be doing something like this,” shares Pascual on how he will prepare for his role.
When asked what’s the most shocking thing they discovered upon researching about Mallari, director Derick Cabrido shares some details on priest serial killer’s background, “Malaking factor ‘yung sa mother niya, ‘yung pumapatay siya para sa mother niya. The mere fact na pumapatay siya and ‘yung organs inaalay niya para sa mom niya, kasi sa storya parang kinukulam daw ‘yung mother so kailangan niyang pumatay para mabuhay ‘yung mother. ‘Yun ‘yung part for me na nakakakilabot, nung pinuntahan namin ‘yung actual na area kung saan dati nakatayo ‘yung simbahan (Magalang, Pampanga pero mas kilala na siya ngayong Concepcion), kung saan nakuha ‘yung bangkay. Imagine, 57 ‘yung namatay na tao nung time na ‘yun.”
Mallari is submitted to the Metro Manila Film Festival which will happen Christmas Day 2023. Producer John Bryan Diamante is hopeful that their film will be an official entry to the said film festival and is also considering submitting it to other film festivals outside the country.
Check out our video coverage of the Mallari media launch: