LOS ANGELES?An up-and-coming actor who is also a radio and TV show host shared with us this amusing anecdote about the time he had a Hollywood superstar as his guest:

?I was allowed to interview ***** but I didn?t think of it that way because there were so many things I was unable to ask. Nonetheless, it was a delight to meet such a magnetic character. He has very intense eyes. He found out my name before I met him so he was able to come up to me and go, ?Hey #####, it?s good to meet you.? I said, ?Ooh, *****, that?s my name? and a little bit of wee-wee came out from me, so the rest of the interview, I was very much on the back foot and didn?t dare mention ***** (a touchy subject for the superstar).?

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?Santa Mesa,? a film written and directed by Ron Morales and which stars Angie Ferro and Jacob Kiron Shalov, recently got a good review in Variety. Hollywood?s trade bible also ran a photo of Angie and Jacob from the movie.

Critic Dennis Harvey wrote, ?An orphaned American 12-year-old?s culture shock, after being shipped off to his previously unknown grandmother in Manila, is the hook to ?Santa Mesa,? writer-director Ron Morales? first feature. Nicely judged effort, whose low-key tenor downplays the story?s potentially lachrymose or melodramatic elements, is in some ways a throwback to the humanist problem dramas of another era ? This polished, engaging pic should make friends on the fest circuit, possibly attracting niche art house, tube or home-format buyers.

?New Jerseyan Hector (Jacob Kiron Shalov) wakes up in the hospital with just minor abrasions after an apparent car accident, but his single Filipina-emigre mother dies. To his own bewilderment, and that of concerned family friend Maggie (Melissa Leo, seen just briefly at beginning and end), he?s told that his grandmother?his sole surviving relative, whom mom never spoke about?has offered to take him in.

?Suddenly the kid is in a teeming Manila slum that?s unlike any he?s experienced before. He speaks no Tagalog, and gruff granny Lita (vet local star Angie Ferro) speaks zero English?but they?d probably dislike each other even if they could communicate. She sells tickets at a railway station, living in an apartment right off the tracks; there?s little for Hector to do but wander the streets. Predictably, that leads to trouble, as the first ?friend? he makes is Miguel (Pierro Rodriguez), the volatile leader of a teen-delinquent gang.

??There are no great surprises here, but Morales displays a deft hand with cast, atmosphere and conflicts that, in other hands, might have turned contrived, preachy or lurid. Highlights in the solid production package are Yaron Orbach?s color-saturated nocturnal lensing and Daniel Belardinelli?s ethereal score.?

(E-mail the columnist at rvnepales_5585@yahoo.com and read his blog, ?The Nepales Report,? on http://blogs.inquirer.net/nepalesreport.)