Filipino filmmaker Carlo Alcos of Nelson, B.C., set out to explore identity and belonging in his documentary “Outsiderness.”
The film became a personal journey toward accepting his Filipino identity and a conversation about what it means to belong.
Alcos, a self-taught filmmaker, opens the documentary with a childhood memory of trying to “wash the brown off” his skin in the shower.
“I moved to Nelson in 2010, and when I moved here, it was not diverse at all,” he said.
“You could count the number of brown people that you came across on the street with one hand.”
Even though he wasn’t bullied as a child, he still wanted to be white.
The documentary explores the often unspoken feeling of being an outsider, Alcos said.
“You’re not alone in these feelings,” he said.
“Maybe there are people who just kind of feel like something’s off and they don’t really know why.”
Alcos grew up in a Filipino household but didn’t learn to speak Tagalog, leaving him feeling “disconnected” from other Filipinos.
“(There’s this) kind of feeling ‘on the outside’ and it made me reflect on my upbringing in Canada,” Alcos said.
Even though Alcos fit in with his peers, he remained acutely aware of being brown in a predominantly white community.
While making the film, Alcos visited relatives in the Philippines, an experience that changed his understanding of family.
“They were hospitable and friendly, and dropped everything to show us around,” he said.
His relatives set up a karaoke night and invited friends over.
They also had albums filled with photos his parents had sent them over the years.
Looking through the albums, he felt they knew him and his family, even though he barely knew them.
“It was a real Filipino experience for me, to be with them, and it just changed my own thoughts about family.”
Alcos said he has been asked “where are you from?” throughout his life, despite being born and raised in Canada.
“I know what they’re asking. It’s because I’m brown,” Alcos said.
“Even though I’m as Canadian as my friends—I do all the same things that my white friends do—I still get asked where I’m from.”
He hopes the documentary encourages viewers to discuss these experiences.
“That’s all part of it. There’s so much that you can touch upon and resonate with,” he said.
He acknowledged that there are no easy answers.
“At some point, I realized the transformation I was going through on a personal level,” he said. The film took about three years to make.
Through that process, Alcos came to embrace his Filipino identity with pride.
“There’s a reason why it’s taken so long to make something like this. Time is needed to go through things: to digest, to process and to change.”
About Carlo Alcos:
Carlo Alcos is a Filipino-Canadian documentary filmmaker, videographer, and sound professional based in Nelson, BC. His film and sound credits include CBC’s The Nature of Things (“War of the Woods”), Knowledge Network’s Wildfire, #MoCrazyStrong (Amazon Prime), and collaborations with non‑profit organizations across the Kootenays. He also edited the short documentary Ahon which was selected for the 2025 Banff Mountain Film Festival. A passionate storyteller and advocate for representation, Carlo brings a multidisciplinary skill set from writing, videography, editing, and sound to projects rooted in social justice, identity, and rural life. He often frames his work as a dialogue rather than a monologue, centering authentic perspectives and fostering communal conversations through film.
Outsiderness synopsis:
Outsiderness is a deeply personal exploration by filmmaker Carlo Alcos, a second-generation Filipino-Canadian whose parents immigrated to British Columbia in the early 1970s. Growing up as a brown kid in a predominantly white suburb, Carlo learned to assimilate to fit in. Through his journey, he begins to question what he lost in the process, and what belonging truly means. Blending family archives, present-day reflections, and candid conversations, Outsiderness unpacks the invisible cost of adaptation and the universal search for identity in multicultural Canada.
“Outsiderness” will be playing exclusively at the Maranatha Church (100 College St. West) in Belleville, Ont. as part of the Jeepney Festival on Friday, Sept. 25, at 7 p.m.
