| Villa Estrella | |
|---|---|
| Directed by | Rico Maria Ilarde |
| Produced by | Malou N. Santos Fritz Silorio |
| Written by | John Paul Abellera Adolfo Alix Jr. |
| Starring | Shaina Magdayao Jake Cuenca Maja Salvador Geoff Eigenmann John Estrada |
| Cinematography | Luis Quirino |
| Distributed by | Star Cinema |
| Release date(s) | PH: July 1, 2009 CA: July 10, 2009 |
| Language | Tagalog & English |
Villa Estrella is a 2009 Philippine horror-drama film produced by Star Cinema for its 16th anniversary offering, It stars Maja Salvador, Jake Cuenca, Geoff Eigenmann and Shaina Magdayaoin the lead role, and is Directed by Rico Maria Ilarde[1].
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Villa Estrella is a horror-drama film produced by Star Cinema for its 16th anniversary offering, it is released in over 100 theaters on July 1, 2009 with an international screening in San Francisco, CA on July 10-16.
This is Director Rico Maria Ilarde's first movie project with Star Cinema, and as a fan of Horror films, he is very honored that the Philippine's leading movie producer had given him a chance to direct "Villa Estrella".
According to him, the main idea to scare the audience with this film is to give them characters that they can see their self with.
“I feel that in order to scare the audiences you have to give them characters that they can root for. You have to get the sympathy of the people on these characters, then you put these characters in a sort of dangerous or scary situation. Those are the important little things that make up the whole of the film. I also believe in the natural acting to make every scene look real.”
He also stressed that one of the scenes that people should see in this movie is the "underwater scene" with Shaina and Maja. He said that for them to be able to accomplish this scene, they needed both Magdayao and Salvador to take a three day underwater training course at Danarra Hotel. The actual shoot was done in a pool in Pansol Hot Springs from 7pm to 5am the next day [2] [3].
How come people who go there are never seen again? Does the villa "eat" people alive?
The movie tells the story of Ana played by Shaina Magdayao[4] who has always been having nightmares about certain people getting killed. Things become scarier when her ex-boyfriend played by Jake Cuenca brings her to Villa Estrella where she meets a girl named Gisele played by Maja Salvador[5] who seems to be very familiar to her
Villa Estrella had a lack of promotion from both Star Cinema and ABS-CBN, having no movie premiere night due to the lead actors Shaina Magdayao, Jake Cuenca and Maja Salvador being in the United States for the Star Magic World Concert Tour from June 26 - 28 at Ontario and San Francisco, California. Making it nearly impossible for them to fly back to Manila in time to have their movie premiere night[6].
Despite being poorly advertised, "Villa Estrella" debuted at no. 3 on its 1st week run earning P 21M in Mega Manila alone, occupying 2nd spot was "Ice Age 3: Dawn of the Dinosaurs" earning P 36.6M in its 1st week run and the top spot was "Transformers: Revenge of the Fallen" which was on its 2nd week run[7].
Villa Estrella on its 2nd week run stayed in no. 3, earned P36,343,703.9 [8].
Villa Estrella total gross for its 4 week run is P46,394,496.00[9].