Gabriela Serrano (b. 1996) is a director, editor, and audiovisual artist based in Manila. She is interested in deeply introspective women’s stories that deconstruct forms and reimagine futures in her native Philippines. She holds a Multimedia Arts degree and is an alumna of the Ricky Lee Scriptwriting Workshop and the SGIFF x Purple Tree Residency.
Starting out as a print illustrator before pivoting to cinema, she has since worked in post-production, editing various film and television projects since 2018. Her editing credits include the Independent Spirit Awards-nominated FX/Hulu series The Choe Show and the QCinema short The Tigers of Infanta. She was named one of CNN Philippines’ “Eight Emerging Directors to Watch Out For” when she made her directorial debut with the short film, Dikit (2021) winner of the Special Jury Prize and Best Director at the Cinemalaya Film Festival. It also screened at the Los Angeles Asian Pacific Film Festival, Queer East Film Festival, and Singapore International Film Festival. Dikit subverted Filipino folk horror through a split-screen depiction of feminine rage, desire, and dreams. Serrano continues her genre explorations of dreams in women’s spaces through the call center sci-fi drama Please Bear With Me, her first full-length film in development, selected at SGIFF Southeast Asian Film Lab (Fellowship Prize), Full Circle Lab Philippines, BIFAN NAFF It Project Market (Asian Discovery Award), Sitges FanPitch, and Festival du Nouveau Cinema Nouveau Marché (Prix FNC Nouveau Marché for Best Feature Film In Development).
