CEBU ? At 30 years old, Kristoffer Villarino is already making his mark in international movies.

For the last four years, the Cebu-born Villarino has been working as head editor for Bigfoot Entertainment, an international production and film financing company with headquarters in Hong Kong and Los Angeles.

Villarino is based at the Bigfoot Studios in Cebu, where the company invested more than P1 billion worth of state-of-the-art production facilities and equipment comparable to those in Hollywood.

He has edited four international films, the most recent of which is ?Midnight Movie,? a slasher flick set for distribution in North America, Germany and Thailand.

Villarino was handpicked by the film?s director, Jack Messitt, for the editing job. They met while working on Bigfoot?s ?Irreversi,? where Messitt was director of photography. ??Midnight Movie? is Jack?s first directorial job. He is very skilled, and for him to put his trust in me felt really good,? said Villarino.

Although a fan more of suspense than of slasher films, Villarino enjoyed the script and immersed himself in the genre to prepare for his work on ?Midnight.?

?I sought the classic elements that people would look for, and tried to find ways to take them to our time. ?Midnight Movie? has an old-school feel, and I wanted to create something that would stand among the best of them,? said Villarino. The film pays homage to ?Jason,? ?Texas Chainsaw Massacre,? and other teen horror movies of the 1980s.

Villarino edited the film in L.A. ?I?m lucky to have had the chance to work in a city with a century of movie history. Wherever I went, I met people from the industry, people who spoke the language of filmmaking,? he recounted happily.

Although technology has advanced significantly in the last 20 years, Villarino revealed that the special effects for ?Midnight Movie? remained traditional. ?The use of practical special effects gave it a more organic feel. It also meant that the editing process was more straightforward, and that I would be relying on my abilities as an editor rather than on CGI,? he noted.

Objective

Villarino said he remained objective by keeping his distance from the set, as it is essential that editors see the footage from an outsider?s point of view. Each week he met with the director and showed him the edits. ?It?s a huge responsibility, being an editor,? he explained. ?Editors can make huge decisions about the flow of the film and have to argue with the director if something doesn?t work.?

?Midnight Movie? was finished last April and Villarino said he is happy with the final product. Along with the scary, yet funny, duality of a teen horror movie that he pictured from the start, he felt that it also made a statement on viewer enjoyment of violence. ?I find it weird that people enjoy it so much,? Villarino said. ?We created one scene where the only thing you hear and see is a killing ? we wanted to take away the music and the fancy effects, and make the audience members think about whether this is still ?fun,? and about why they?re so entertained by it.?

Villarino had thought of working in the film industry since his high school days at the University of San Carlos. Studying engineering for three years at USC only created greater hunger for art, so he changed gears and graduated with a Fine Arts degree in Advertising.

On working at Bigfoot, Villarino said: ?It?s an experience way beyond my dreams, and I never even had to leave Cebu. Who would have thought the making of Hollywood movies would land in my backyard? It?s been wonderful.?