Blanka

Eleven year old Blanka lives alone in Manila, begging and stealing from tourists. One day a strange idea comes to her: if she could buy a mother she would have a good life. While she is trying to save up for it she meets Peter, a blind street musician of fifty five; he teaches her to sing and the child begins to earn money by it. But when Peter, worried about her future, decides to take Blanka to an orphanage, she runs away. The film neither makes the child an object of pity nor turns her into a hero; it shows the daily arithmetic of staying on the street. Cydel Gabutero plays the lead in Kohki Hasei’s seventy five minute film, completed in 2015.