We had the good fortune of connecting with Achim Mendoza and we’ve shared our conversation below.

Hi Achim, we’d love to hear more about how you thought about starting your own business?
My sister, Mima Holt, and I started “Dusty Films” because we wanted to have a mechanism to be able to help other filmmakers from underrepresented backgrounds tell their stories. We identified key areas where independent filmmakers struggle and would be focused on those areas in our initial phase. One area is of course fundraising, and my sister is focused on that area. On the other hand, we notice that a lot of filmmakers struggle with their post-production needs, and so we will be focusing on that too–guiding producers and directors in finding a sustainable way to fund and complete the post-production of their projects.

Can you open up a bit about your work and career? We’re big fans and we’d love for our community to learn more about your work.
So I am a freelance filmmaker–I mostly edit and also direct. My most recent work as an editor is ALOK, which is a short documentary on Alok Vaid-Menon. It recently had its premiere at the 2024 edition of the Sundance Film Festival. As a director, I have two shorts that are currently doing the rounds at various film festivals: Connection, which I describe as a “bilingual tiktok musical battle between a Filipino musician and a French content creator;” and A Karaoke Space Odyssey, which is a “scifi romcom karaoke musical” about an undocumented Filipino going on a karaoke date with a strange man, who turns out to be an alien from outer space. Most of my works deal with the question on how we can form connections and bonds with other people in a world that seems cruel and unjust?

Getting to this point in my career, honestly, is receiving a thousand rejections and turning that one rare “maybe’ to a “yes” and turning that single “yes” to a couple more yesses. Sometimes, showing up and putting your best foot forward really is key. Some of my biggest opportunities came from me applying to a program, or a festival–or anything for that matter–that I thought would be a no, then getting a yes from it.

If you had a friend visiting you, what are some of the local spots you’d want to take them around to?
I live in Koreatown and I always invite my friends from out-of-town to visit Koreatown! There are a lot of cafes and bars that I frequent to here. For coffee, Open Market, Cafe Mak, and MCO are some of my go-tos. For drinks, I go to The Prince, the Normandie Club, and HMS Bounty. I also am a big fan of the public library here, and sometimes take my work there. It’s an amazing place to visit or take a breather in if you’re in downtown LA!

Shoutout is all about shouting out others who you feel deserve additional recognition and exposure. Who would you like to shoutout?
Aside from family and friends, the one person who really had an impact on my life was my mentor, Marilou Diaz-Abaya, a renowned Filipino director. When I was 12 years old, I stayed in Manila for a month from my home province so I could take film production classes for kids (yes it existed at that time!) This was just supposed to be a summer thing–just a reason to be out of my hometown and my comfort zone. However, one day, Marilou visited our class and saw some of my work and immediately called for my parents. Luckily, my parents were visiting Manila then so we were able to set that meeting up. It was in this meeting that she asked my parents if she could mentor me. That really changed the trajectory of my life and made my family think filmmaking is a viable career option for me. Of course, this wasn’t going to be easy. I was still living back in Davao then so when Marilou called for me, sometimes I’d spend the weekend at Manila (I had to take a flight to do this), and then resume my normal high school life during the weekday. It was crazy, but I learned so much from her during these times!

Several years into her mentorship of me, Marilou would eventually get a cancer diagnosis and succumb to it. Before she did, she implored that I explore the world, and go back to filmmaking if I really wanted to. I think this was the greatest thing she taught me, because I did end up doing a lot of things outside of the world of filmmaking. So when I did get back to it at a much older age, I realized that my experiences in life and in the world have colored my art and wor

Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/addik_92/

Other: https://www.imdb.com/name/nm12816212/

Image Credits
Sthanlee Mirador Bianca Catbagan

Nominate Someone: ShoutoutLA is built on recommendations and shoutouts from the community; it’s how we uncover hidden gems, so if you or someone you know deserves recognition please let us know here.