Once a Moth

Nora Aunor stars, in what is often deemed her finest performance, as Corazon de la Cruz, a Filipina nurse. Living near the US Clark Air Base on Luzon Island, she dreams of a better life in the United States… until the unspeakable happens.

Directed by Lupita Aquino-Kashiwahara, Once A Moth is a long-lost, rarely-seen landmark of Filipino cinema, here miraculously salvaged and restored despite weather-worn elements and a missing first reel. A timeless, galvanising, anti-imperialist classic conceived as a protest film against the unending occupation of the Philippines by foreign powers, it gives their wings back to those attracted and irrevocably burned by the flame of the American Dream.

Special Features and Technical Specs:

• 2K RESTORATION BY ABS-CBN
• Featurette on the restoration (9mins, 2023)
• Before and After (1min, 2018)
• Restoration Trailer
• Booklet with Archival Photographs courtesy of the Mowelfund Library and Audiovisual Archives
• New writing by scholars Jose B. Capino and John Labella
• Interview with Digna Santiago
• Interview with Marina Feleo Gonzalez by critic Aaron Hunt
• New art by Luigi Almuena
• Optional English Subtitles
• REIGON-A "LOCKED"