When the Waves Are Gone

Overall the film capitalises on the spareness to deliver a payoff that feels downright mythic in its primal charge – like Dostoevsky, Jacobean tragedy and High Noon, in one brutal cocktail.

Has enough memorable images to make it an imperfect but haunting experience.

Kapag Wala Nang Mga Alon is an admission as much as it is a story of resistance against the political current – about how sorrowful our past was, our present is, and possibly even our future will be.

The real horror of Diaz’s film lies in its recognition of how meaningless all these conflicts are.