Aswang: The White Lady

The air around you is still, the temperature in the room is dropping with a chilling bite that makes the hair on the back of your neck stand up. Your feet feel like they are encased in concrete while your hands and arms are frozen in place. There is a loud thumping sound you can hear but you realize it’s just your heartbeat that keeps getting faster and louder. This is what fear feels like when faced with something truly horrifying. The Laurin family has created this exact emotion with their feature film Aswang (now available on Amazon Prime Video and itunes for download).
Michel Laurin, owner of Magic Sky Films, got his inspiration on a trip back to his wife’s Native country the Philippines. “One of our trips over there I saw a haunted house, and there was a legend about Aswang, they also call it the White Lady.” This also fits with the folklore of vampires and the boogieman, it’s more of a general term for all things ghoulish and creepy in the Philippines. In this version of the Aswang the “White Lady” needs to find a young host to possess in order to stay amongst the living. Soon after, the Laurin family brought over a small crew and hired actors to begin filming Aswang:
As a family waits for their beach house to be completed they decide to take up in an old house that is known throughout the community for being haunted by the horrifying Aswang. The events that later ensue are ones of terrifying consequence and leaves a family’s love for each other and strength put to the test in a bitter fight for survival.
When filming this film, the Laurin family wanted to utilize some of the most interesting places like the largest bat cave in the world. The cave is located on the Samal Island near Davao City and has over 2.5 million bats who call it home. “I really liked the locations, it is something very interesting for people to see and it gave really good production value as well.”
When the family is not trying to survive they call the Santa Clarita Valley home where they own and operate Santa Clarita Karate a local martial arts studios. “My background is martial arts, I’ve won six world championships and my dream afterwards was to move to L.A to make movies.” The next step for Michel and Magic Sky Films are several projects lined up for this year. “ We have seven projects completed, with different genres. We have action, we have sci-fi…horror was just the beginning.” 

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