CAAMFest-goers recently had the opportunity to screen Graceland, a Filipino thriller set in the unpredictable underbelly of Manila. Winner of an audience award at the 2012 Tribeca Film Festival, Graceland details the events that unfold as a lowly chauffeur’s daughter is mistakenly kidnapped for a corrupt politician’s child. To save his daughter, Marlon Villar becomes inextricably tied with the dealings of his employer, the corrupt Manual Chango, setting off a chain of events that will change both their lives forever.

The second of writer/director Ron Morales’s works, Graceland was one of five films shortlisted for “Best Foreign Film” at the Academy of the Philippines and also won Best Narrative Feature Award during the 2012 San Diego Asian Film Festival. “Graceland is a story about one underdog who decides he wants to take something for himself, and what happens to him as a result,” Morales says. “I interviewed a number of people – especially young people – who had had their voices taken away from them through the tributaries of poverty, organized crime, and sexual exploitation.

The inability of these people to represent their daily struggles resonated strongly with me. I felt that theirs’ was the story about my homeland that I wanted to tell.”

Graceland will be available on all video-on-demand platforms beginning Thursday, Mar. 28, and will be screened in select theaters across the U.S. beginning Apr. 15. Visit the film’s website to learn more information and to find a screening near you.