New documentary Settling St. Malo tells the story of Louisiana's early Filipino settlers

UL Lafayette professor Randy Gonzales's 26-minute documentary about St. Malo, the Filipino fishing village recognised as America's oldest Asian settlement, screens at Lafayette's Southern Screen Festival on 21 November.

A new 26-minute documentary, "Settling St. Malo," tells the story of the Filipino immigrants who built communities along Louisiana's coast, The Advocate reported on 4 November. The film features the research and poetry of Randy Gonzales, a University of Louisiana at Lafayette English professor and New Orleans native of Filipino descent.

The film recently premiered at the New Orleans Film Festival. Its next screening is part of the Southern Screen Festival in Lafayette on Saturday, 21 November, according to the university and The Advocate.

A village on Lake Borgne

St. Malo was a fishing village on Lake Borgne in St. Bernard Parish, about 5 miles from New Orleans, and is recognised as the country's oldest Asian settlement, The Advocate said. Filipino fishermen there adapted their knowledge of coastal living and seafood harvesting to Louisiana's wetlands, and the settlement was destroyed by storms in the early 20th century.

The documentary begins in 1930s New Orleans, where Gonzales discovers that his great-grandfather was a leader in the city's Filipino community, the university said. It then moves to coastal fishing communities like St. Malo, using poetry, archival footage, reenactments and visits to the marshland where the village once stood. The Southern Screen listing says the film also covers Manila Village.

According to both the university and The Advocate, the film looks back to the 19th and early 20th centuries, when Louisiana had the largest Filipino population in the United States.

From poetry to film

The film follows Gonzales's award-winning 2023 poetry collection of the same name, published by UL Press. It was directed by Virgile Beddock, an associate professor who leads UL Lafayette's moving image arts program, and university students and alumni worked on it as actors and crew.

"This story continues to be written," Gonzales says in the film.

Gonzales, a former co-vice president of the Philippine-Louisiana Historical Society, helped secure state approval for a historical marker commemorating St. Malo and wrote its text. He is now working on a book for LSU Press, "Adobo at Gumbo: Savoring the Culinary History and Food Culture of Filipino Louisiana," about the foodways of early Filipino settlers.

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