Posthouse

Clearing out the posthouse that he inherited from his father Cyril (Sid Lucero) come across a silent film that his father was working on. Dated from 1922 it’s a horror titled Ang Manananggal. His daughter Rea (Bea Binene) is a filmmaker and is keen to finish the project. Reluctantly Cyril agrees.

However Cyril is committed to completing an advert and comes into conflict with Jeffrey (Rafa Siguion-Reyna) an inefficient assistant who’s been foisted on him. There’s also his ex-wife and Rea’s mother who has little to no confidence in him as a father because of his past issues.

As work on the restoration continues, odd things start to happen, and a reel goes missing. It starts to become clear that there is more to the film than they had previously thought.

Directed by Nikolas Red, cowritten with Jericho Aguado and Kenneth Dagatan, this is an assured debut. Red makes the best of the confined space of the location developing tension and dread with terrific use of light and shadow. Crucially he and the writers don’t forget about the story and there’s a good deal of background that develops Cyril’s character, who is key to the events.

What is also effective is the blending of the 1922 footage with the events unravelling in the posthouse. They don’t appear incongruous in fact Red develops a curiosity of how that film will end.

While the film generally concentrates on creating atmosphere and on a psychological level with the protagonists, with judicial glimpses of the creature, there’s no shying away from the horror of what is in the unfinished film, and the manifestation of the evil is well controlled.

Posthouse received its International Premiere at FrightFest Halloween 2025.