Glowing under the moonlight, she smokes a cigarette while looking down at the worlds below: the well dressed bourgeois colonial men and the ragged, blood stained mercenaries. Played by the director herself, this neo-noir period drama places a queer protagonist within the politics of corrupt and power hungry men during the 1970s, at the height of Marcos’ dictatorship in the Philippines.

She occupies the space in between. Between the police and ordinary people, between power and morality, between past intimacy with a fellow officer and a future vision of solidarity with the public. Her position is neither fully inside nor outside these structures, but moving across them.

The film uses the charged relationship between the protagonist and her former lover to carve out a fragile space for queer existence within a larger world where queer people rarely hold power. Through this personal dynamic, the story reveals how intimacy, loyalty, and betrayal intersect with broader political realities. Love in the time of dictatorship, literally.

Kabilugan ng buwan at ang hangin ay may kalamigan. Aakapin kita mahal ko, sa buong magdamag (The moon is full and the air is cold, I will hold you, my love, all night long) - Danny Javier from Apo Hiking Society, 1980

(text by Sarnt Utamachote)