Violator (film)

At the height of a super-typhoon that could well be the first wave of an impending Apocalypse, five men take refuge in a flooded-in police station and spend the rest of the night with a prisoner who may or may not be the Devil.

• Victor Neri as Gilberto Pring
• Anthony Falcon as Lukas Manabat
• RK Bagatsing as Gabriel Ragas
• Timothy Mabalot as Nathan Winston Payumo
• Andy Bais as Vic
• Joel Lamangan as Benito Alano

Writer-director Dayao is a film critic, and Violator is his directorial debut. He says the step was natural to him, though he accepts others find it less so. When casting the film, Dayao consciously cast the actors against type. All of the actors were his first choices, and they all took the roles that he desired.^[2]

Violator premiered on November 10, 2014, at the Cinema One Originals film festival.^[3]

Derek Elley of Film Business Asia rated the film 6 out of 10 stars and, while calling it an impressive debut, wrote that it "is stronger on technique than actual content".^[3] Richard Kuipers of Variety wrote, "This stylishly assembled Filipino chiller creates plenty of intrigue but can't quite deliver a knockout punch."^[1] Michael Atkinson of The Village Voice called it "an apocalyptic creep-out as heavy with atmosphere and portent as a doomsday sermon".^[4] Todd Brown of Twitch Film called it "a gorgeously executed and tightly controlled exercise in religious dread".^[5]