I watched Forgotten Island, DreamWorks Animation’s new feature inspired by Filipino mythology, and felt something I did not expect.
Pride.
Not simply because it is a major animated film, but because I was watching a world that felt familiar.
The manananggal. The kapre. The diwata.
Stories and creatures that many Filipinos grew up hearing about are now part of a film that audiences around the world can discover.
For us, they are not simply mythology.
They are memory.
And that word stayed with me.
Because the film also features a memory demon, a creature that robs people of their memories.
I couldn’t help thinking about my mother.
What Happens When We Forget?
My mother has been bedridden since November 2025. We have not eaten out on a Sunday since.
Before that, Sundays were simple. We would go to St. Stephen Church, where I often saw her happiest. She remembered studying there as a child. Something about the place seemed to bring her back.
After church, we would have our cheat meal.
Church, memories, food.
A simple Sunday.
I never thought much about those Sundays when we were living them.
Now I miss them.
My mother has dementia, and it seems to be getting worse. Sometimes she knows who I am. Sometimes she doesn’t.
Often, she introduced me to her caregiver as her brother. I smiled.
What else could I do?
I knew exactly who she was. She knew I was someone familiar. But the connection between us, the one I have known my entire life, was no longer completely accessible to her.
In the movie, a creature steals memories. In real life, dementia can take them away without anyone to blame.
And that made me think about what memory really means. We think memory is about names, faces, places and dates. But memory gives us continuity.
It tells us who we were, who we love, where we came from and why certain people matter.
When memory works, we hardly notice it. We simply wake up knowing who we are. Then, sometimes, memory begins to disappear.
And the people who love us become the ones who remember for us.
Why the Movie Moved Me
That is why Forgotten Island stayed with me. The film brings Filipino mythology into a global animated world.
But what moved me was not simply recognition. It was the idea that stories can survive by being retold.
Something that lived in oral tradition can become animation.
A creature our grandparents might have talked about can become part of a new world. A story familiar to Filipinos can suddenly be experienced by someone on the other side of the world.
Culture survives because someone remembers enough to tell the story again. And every generation gets to give inherited stories a new life.
Watching the film, I found myself thinking about my mother again.
There are things she no longer remembers. But I remember.
I remember the Sundays. The church.
Her happiness there. The meals afterward. The woman she was before dementia began taking pieces of her memory away.
Perhaps that is one of the quiet responsibilities of being a son.
When someone we love can no longer carry every memory, we carry some of it for them.
One More Sunday
Her physical therapy sessions are meant to help her regain strength and eventually sit in a wheelchair.
But her sleep schedule has become irregular, interrupting the sessions.
Her physical therapist wisely advised us not to proceed when she has not slept.
So we wait. We adjust. We hope.
And I keep thinking about St. Stephen Church. If only I could bring her there again. One more Sunday. One more time.
Would the place bring something back?
Would she remember studying there?
Would she remember being happy?
And when she looked at me, would she remember me as her son?
I don’t know.
Maybe she would. Maybe she wouldn’t.
That uncertainty is one of the hardest parts of dementia. I cannot make her remember. I cannot give her back everything that has disappeared.
But I can be there. I can care for her.
And I can remember.
Perhaps that is what love sometimes becomes. Not being remembered.
Remembering for someone else.
Why I Hope Filipinos Watch This Film
That is why I hope Filipinos watch Forgotten Island.
Not because we need a global film to tell us that our mythology matters.
It mattered long before this movie.
But there is something special about seeing pieces of ourselves reflected in a story made for the world.
Maybe you will recognize a creature you heard about as a child. Maybe a character will remind you of something your grandparents told you. Maybe a moment will bring back something you had forgotten. Maybe, like me, you will leave the theater thinking about someone you love.
That is what stories can do. They don’t simply entertain us. Sometimes, they return something to us.
A memory. A feeling. A part of ourselves.
And perhaps that is why representation matters. Not because someone else finally noticed us. But because sometimes, seeing ourselves in a story reminds us who we are.
Forgotten Island, Forgotten Memories
My mother is forgetting. Our Sunday routines are gone for now. The church visits. The cheat meals. The ordinary moments I once assumed would always be there.
But some things remain. I remember. And now, because of a movie, I find myself thinking about memory differently.
Filipino mythology survived because generations remembered enough to tell the stories again.
My mother’s memories survive, in part, because the people around her remember them.
Maybe that is what we do for one another. We carry what someone else can no longer carry. We tell what might otherwise be forgotten. We pass it forward. So if you have a chance, go watch Forgotten Island.
Watch it for the mythology. Watch it for the animation. Watch it because it is Filipino.
But perhaps most of all, watch it because you might see something of yourself in it.
And maybe, somewhere between the creatures, the stories and the laughter, you will remember someone. Someone you love. Someone you miss. Someone who helped make you who you are.
Because sometimes the stories we watch are really stories about ourselves. And sometimes, remembering is an act of love.