Growing up as a mixed Filipina American in Lake Arrowhead, California, Jill Marie Sachs never felt like she belonged. Visiting the Philippines for the first time at 13 — meeting family members she never knew she had, eating ube birthday cake and singing karaoke — was transformational, giving he r confidence she’d sorely missed. On that trip, her cousins dragged her to the beach in the middle of a rainstorm to tell monster stories from local folklore. Sachs had always been drawn to horror, in no small part to rebel against the conservative norms of her small town. Learning about monsters from a different culture, like the vampiric fetus-eater, manananggál, fascinated her. This childhood trip, strung between a search for the supernatural and a search for identity, formed the basis of “Taga,” Sach’s latest short film screening at the 2026 Sundance Film Festival.  Sachs explained the title translates to “from” as well as “to stab” in Tagalog, which is a fitting moniker for a horror film about cultural belonging. “Culture is a funny thing. You don’t know exactly where it lies,” Sachs said. “Does it lie in the language? Does it lie in singing karaoke with your family? Does it lie in eating lumpia and ube? Or is it something deeper? Does it lie in the myths and the stories that existed before the Spanish?” The film follows Vivi, a third culture Filipina American, who travels to the Philippines with an eco-volunteer group in an attempt to reconnect with her roots. Much of the conflict is created from friction between the eco-volunteer group and the locals they’re trying to help.  Sachs based the volunteers on some of the people she met while traveling in the Philippines, who were there on some sort of mission  — to change, help or save other people — rather than traveling to appreciate the culture or find themselves. Sometimes, Sachs said, volunteers would become bitter with the locals, blaming them for the problems they’d come to fix. The eco-volunteers in “Taga” show no respect for the Filipino locals or their customs, which leads to the emergence of the Nangangatok, a door-knocking spirit straight out of folklore.  “Taga” was filmed in the Cordillera mountain range in the Province of Kalinga in the Philippines.  The film crew transported the segmented monster costume, as well as a few fake body parts, in five carry-on bags through customs in China. But it was editor Joey Scoma’s hard drives to hold film footage that caught the attention of customs officers — thankfully, they made it through unscathed.  Arriving in the Philippines, the crew met Ruel Bimuyag, the film’s “fixer” who served as a liaison between the crew and the local communities. Bimuyag and his wife, Irene, assisted with a variety of tasks, such as offering their property as a place to shoot, finding extras and helping to obtain filming permits.  The biggest challenge in filming was constant rain. “Our camera crew was at times sliding down the mud trying to rescue the Alexa (camera),” Sachs recalled. But the troubles with Chinese customs and the endless mud have been well worth it. Sachs has connected with countless people through “Taga” who have been through the same third culture kid experience she has. At Filipino community screenings, Sachs has been able to identify birds of a feather by a tattoo: three dots inked by the 108-year-old traditional Kalinga tattooist Apo Whang-Od, representing herself and her two apprentices. Sachs has the tattoo on her own arm. “You just know instantly you have so much of that wandering and questioning and yearning in common when you see that tattoo,” Sachs said. “A lot of people, especially from our Filipino community screenings, have come up to me afterwards and been like, ‘This is me. I’ve done this journey, besides the monster part.’” “Taga” will premiere as part of the Midnight Short Film Program at 11:55 p.m. on Jan. 25 at The Ray Theatre. Learn more and reserve tickets at https://festival.sundance.org/program/film/6932f98db27e9d9437e0e8c7. ‘Taga’ in-person screenings 11:55 p.m., Jan. 25, The Ray Theatre 8:50 p.m., Jan. 26, Megaplex Redstone 3 3:30 p.m., Jan. 27, Broadway Centre Cinemas 6 12:30 p.m., Jan. 30, Holiday Village Cinemas 1 8:50 p.m., Feb. 1, Megaplex Redstone 3 Online 8 a.m., Jan. 29-11:55 p.m., Feb. 1 The post Sundance short film ‘Taga’ creates horror from the search for belonging appeared first on Park Record. ...read more read less