Depicting Development Issues: Thematic Trends of Documentary Films of Mindanao-Based Filmmakers

Mindanao is the Philippine's second largest island in the south. Identifying Mindanao-based documentaries that have development themes remain unknown or unacknowledged. Using Phenomenology as theoretical framework and method, as a result, the researcher found out that similar to other documentary films in other parts of the country and the world, the themes showed by Mindanao-based documentaries reflect on agriculture, health, women and children, environment and population. However unlike its other foreign and local counterparts, a number of Mindanao-based documentaries anchor the mentioned development themes under the context of peace and conflict situation, human rights, indigenous peoples and their ancestral domains.