FILIPINA writer-director Martika Ramirez Escobar's debut movie 'Leonor Will Never Die' won the World Cinema Dramatic Special Jury Award: Innovative Spirit at the 2022 Sundance Film Festival on Saturday (Manila time).

Regarded as a 'movie-within-a-movie and a homage to '80s Pinoy action movies,' the jury citation reads, 'Switching in-between genres, this film within a film follows an ailing screenwriter who enters her unfinished screenplay of a gangster film to experience and edit her own creation. Constantly shifting in tone, the film is a playful display of the love of cinema. Its innovative and risk-taking spirit is especially commendable. '