Lingua Franca: A personal story & distinctive storytelling

Isabel Sandoval’s Lingua Franca intimately invites audiences to the life-world of Olivia, an undocumented trans Filipina immigrant in Brooklyn, New York.

The film gives cineastes the “autoethnographical” perspective to understand the daily triumphs and struggles of a caregiver to a Russian-Jewish immigrant named Olga, who has a grandson Alex. Unaware of the Pinay immigrant’s gender identity, he gets romantically involved with Olivia, who has to secure her status via a green-card marriage.

“I think ultimately it’s about me having the choice and asserting to tell a story that I want to tell in my own terms and without any compromise,” answered director Isabel, who also wrote the movie screenplay and played Olivia, when asked if empowerment was part of her intentions in filming Lingua Franca in a virtual media call. Isabel’s narrative is again about a person who belongs to a minority group (“a woman of color and an immigrant”) that reflects her context which could pigeonhole her as an auteur.

“For me, instead of seeing that as a limitation or a way that powers that be to marginalize us, storytellers, I wanted to use that opportunity to tell a story that’s very personal, unique and distinctive,” she said. “As a result, you’ll make a film that no one else can make.” It means challenging the status quo and clichés about the dramatis personae and the issues they face.

This is the reason why Isabel’s Lingua Franca fits TBA Studios that values the filmmaker’s originality and vision. The production and distribution company has acquired the film for the Philippines and Asia. Lingua Franca can be accessed and watched through PVOD (premium video on demand) on TBA Studios’ online platform, Cinema’76@Home, on Eventive. The platform carries foreign-language and Hollywood films and Pinoy mainstream and independent movies.

Through Lingua Franca, Isabel wanted to “shine a light” on such topics as immigration and trans experiences, while her film aesthetics, sensibility and style are being showcased.

What was the idea behind the film title?

Referencing a dictionary definition, Isabel said that lingua franca is a bridge language between immigrants. “Here in the film, it means ironically because while Olivia and Alex do communicate with each other, what is actually most important (and) what matters most between them is what is left unsaid, what’s left unarticulated,” she added. “They spend the entire arc of the movie mustering up the courage and overcoming their personal weaknesses in order to attempt to articulate what they really need (from) each other.” Isabel shared that “In Lingua Franca, it is usually the pauses and the silences more than the dialogues that communicate and convey more truth about the characters and their situations than the dialogues they have for each other.” Lingua Franca has graced over 40 international film festivals like the Venice Film Festival and received rave reviews from the critics.

Reflecting on the film’s milieu and message and the filmmaker’s style, one may say that Lingua Franca also speaks about Isabel’s positionality and personality as a full-length feature creator, “We’re coming from a place of authenticity and truth that we (storytellers) are able to tell stories about ourselves in our own communities both in front of and behind the camera. Lingua Franca being made in complete fidelity to my vision as an author and auteur makes the idea of auteurism in this day and age and under the current circumstances not just the aesthetic one but a political one.”

Like any lingua franca, films serve as a bridge for audiences to make sense of the real world from the reel.

(To watch Lingua Franca and other movies, check out: https://cinema76fs.eventive.org/films. Ticket price is P249 per rental and the platform accepts credit and debit cards.)