Martika Ramirez Escobar
DirectorRajiv Idnani
ProducerPhilippines
CountryLogline
Three lives intertwine like kindred beings from the same soil. Lucia, a curious tour guide who unknowingly meets her father for the first time, lives vicariously through two people - a pet shop owner who tries to keep a dying mermaid alive and a fish vendor whose long missing husband reappears from nowhere.
Short Synopsis
Lucia is perpetually curious. She is a museum tour guide who specializes in maps - lives life through two people. First is Raquel, whose fisherman husband disappeared in the sea. She was pregnant with their daughter, and also hopeful of a future with the family she always wanted. Five years later, she is still waiting. Through myths in the fishing village about a sighting of her husband, him visiting Raquel in her dream and questions asked by their daughter who never had a father, Raquel decides to look for him.
At 60 years old Dewey’s world is his pet shop. While running errands, he stumbles upon a dying mermaid at the wet market and decides to take care of it. Along with his neighbor, they form a relationship that is built between their effort in keeping the mermaid alive. Slowly we realize that his affinity with the creature stems from the fact that he is a descendant of mermaids in the Philippines.
Lucia lives through other's mysteries to find comfort in her own. She has never met her biological father. For work she is assigned to pick-up original copies of Philippine maps in Spain. She travels from Manila to Madrid where she meets Danilo, the cartographer who is assigned for the project with whom she finds a unique connection. While doing an interview with him, she discovers that the special connection stems from the coincidence that he is the father she never met. Oceans connect these characters that are like islands - with little worlds, contained in space and time.
Martika Ramirez Escobar
Martika Ramirez Escobar, born in 1992 and based in Manila, is a filmmaker known for her bizarre short films and debut feature "Leonor Will Never Die" (2022), which gained attention by winning the Special Jury Prize for Innovative Spirit at Sundance. It was also nominated for Best Foreign Language Film at the prestigious Independent Spirit Awards and received acclaim at TIFF, where she received the Amplify Voices Award. Martika earned the New Visions Best Director award at Sitges and collected several awards while being nominated in over a hundred festivals worldwide.
Martika graduated with honors from the University of the Philippines, and her thesis film, "Stone Heart" (2014), won Best Film at Cinemalaya and competed at the 19th Busan International Film Festival. She's been part of various film programs like the Asian Film Academy, Berlinale Talents, Talents Tokyo, Ties That Bind and has received support from the Purin Pictures Film Fund and Next Masters Support Program.
Known for her unique artistic style, Martika not only directs but also works as a cinematographer. Her cinematography has been featured in films that competed in Venice, Locarno, and Cinemalaya, where she recently won the Best Cinematography award for "When This Is All Over."
"Daughters of the Sea” is Martika’s second feature film. It is currently in the script development stage after participating in the First Cut Lab and Asian Project Market of the Busan International Film Festival.
Rajiv Idnani
Arkeofilms is a recognized independent film production company based in Manila. They support filmmakers with a strong vision and produce strange and curious work that inspire discourse. Their works have been screened in hundreds of film festivals and have won awards and recognition from the local industry, critics and the press. Their projects in development have been funded by national agencies and selected for special programs abroad such as Busan’s ACF, Berlinale Talents Tokyo and the IDFA Academy.
The company is pursuing international co-productions for its upcoming full-length features as well as the development of original content for television and new media platforms. The Sundance-winning “Leonor Will Never Die,” a surreal action drama about a filmmaker who gets transported into one of her films, is the most recent production with Anima Studios, directed by Martika Ramirez Escobar. The project has received support from Purin Pictures, Talents Tokyo and have won major awards in Sundance, Toronto and Sitges.
Arkeofilms pursue and shepherd stories that are fresh, courageous and relevant. We work with filmmakers and artists who want to try new ideas for cinema and bring this discipline to other forms of content.
The team is currently developing a surreal drama feature, Daughters of the Sea by Martika Ramirez Escobar, Mando's Better World by Joel Ruiz and God of Wrestling by Mihk Vergara.