Cirio H. Santiago was a prolific Filipino

Philippines

The Philippines , officially known as the Republic of the Philippines , is a country in Southeast Asia in the western Pacific Ocean. To its north across the Luzon Strait lies Taiwan. West across the South China Sea sits Vietnam...

 film producer, director, writer and cinematographer. He also uses the screen names: Cirio Santiago and Leonard Hermes.

Life and career

Santiago was born on January 18, 1936 in Manila

Manila

Manila is the capital of the Philippines. It is one of the sixteen cities forming Metro Manila.Manila is located on the eastern shores of Manila Bay and is bordered by Navotas and Caloocan to the north, Quezon City to the northeast, San Juan and Mandaluyong to the east, Makati on the southeast,...

, Philippines

Philippines

The Philippines , officially known as the Republic of the Philippines , is a country in Southeast Asia in the western Pacific Ocean. To its north across the Luzon Strait lies Taiwan. West across the South China Sea sits Vietnam...

 to Dr. Ciriaco Santiago, the founder of Manila’s Premiere Productions, and his wife Adela Hermoso. He had two siblings, Danilo H. Santiago and Digna H. Santiago.

In the 1970s, he directed mostly English-language action/adventure films, some of which portrayed black actors and actresses as heroes. He is known for the films such as Savage!

Savage! (film)

Savage! is a 1973 American blaxploitation film directed by Cirio H. Santiago. The film deals with a strapping young black mercenary blowing things up in the jungle.The soundtrack is by Don Julian....

(1973), T.N.T. Jackson

T.N.T. Jackson

T.N.T. Jackson is a 1974 American film directed by Cirio H. Santiago.The film is also known as Dynamite Jackson , Dynamite Wong and TNT Jackson .- Cast :...

(1975) and Firehawk (1993). In the 1980s, he focused on creating low-budget Vietnam

Vietnam

Vietnam – sometimes spelled Viet Nam , officially the Socialist Republic of Vietnam – is the easternmost country on the Indochina Peninsula in Southeast Asia. It is bordered by China to the north, Laos to the northwest, Cambodia to the southwest, and the South China Sea –...

 war movies. He had worked with U.S. producer, Roger Corman

Roger Corman

Roger William Corman is an American film producer, director and actor. He has mostly worked on low-budget B movies. Some of Corman's work has an established critical reputation, such as his cycle of films adapted from the tales of Edgar Allan Poe, and in 2009 he won an Honorary Academy Award for...

 and U.S. directors namely Jonathan Demme

Jonathan Demme

Robert Jonathan Demme is an American filmmaker, producer and screenwriter. Best known for directing The Silence of the Lambs, which won him the Academy Award for Best Director, he has also directed the acclaimed movies Philadelphia, Rachel Getting Married, the Talking Heads concert movie Stop...

, Joe Dante

Joe Dante

Joseph "Joe" Dante, Jr. is an American film director and producer of films generally with humorous and science fiction content....

 and Carl Franklin

Carl Franklin

Carl Franklin is an American actor, screenwriter and film and television director. Franklin is a graduate of University of California, Berkeley and continued his education at the AFI Conservatory, where he graduated with an M.F.A. degree in directing in 1986...

. In 1995, he became the president of the Philippines Film Development Fund, a position appointed to him by the then President Fidel V. Ramos

Fidel V. Ramos

Fidel "Eddie" Valdez Ramos , popularly known as FVR, was the 12th President of the Philippines from 1992 to 1998. During his six years in office, Ramos was widely credited and admired by many for revitalizing and renewing international confidence in the Philippine economy.Prior to his election as...

, to improve the quality of Filipino

Philippines

The Philippines , officially known as the Republic of the Philippines , is a country in Southeast Asia in the western Pacific Ocean. To its north across the Luzon Strait lies Taiwan. West across the South China Sea sits Vietnam...

 films and also to encourage the production of foreign movies on location in the Philippines

Philippines

The Philippines , officially known as the Republic of the Philippines , is a country in Southeast Asia in the western Pacific Ocean. To its north across the Luzon Strait lies Taiwan. West across the South China Sea sits Vietnam...

.

Cirio Santiago died September 26, 2008 from lung cancer. He left behind his wife Annabelle and his children Christopher, Cathy, Claudine and Cirio Jr. His third son Cyril died just a few months earlier.

Quentin Tarantino

Quentin Tarantino

Quentin Jerome Tarantino is an American film director, screenwriter, producer, cinematographer and actor. In the early 1990s, he began his career as an independent filmmaker with films employing nonlinear storylines and the aestheticization of violence...

 counts Santiago among his influences and based some of the characters in Kill Bill

Kill Bill

Kill Bill Volume 1 is a 2003 action thriller film written and directed by Quentin Tarantino. It is the first of two volumes that were theatrically released several months apart, the second volume being Kill Bill Volume 2....

 on Santiago's movies.

Producer

• Operation Balikatan (2003) (producer)
• When Eagles Strike
  When Eagles Strike
  When Eagles Strike is a 2003 action film starring ex-bodybuilder Christian Boeving, Stacy Keach, Nate Adams, Eddie Garcia and Monsour del Rosario. It was directed/co-produced by Cirio H. Santiago, and also shot on Philippines due to low budget....
  
  (2003) (producer)
• Vital Parts (2001) (producer) or Harold Robbins' Body Parts (USA)
• Anak ng bulkan (1997) (producer)
• Damong ligaw (1997) (executive producer)
• Kadre (1997) (executive producer)
• Vulcan (1997) (producer)
• Robo Warriors (1996) (executive producer)
• Terminal Virus (1995) (TV) (producer) or Last Chance
• Angel of Destruction (1994) (producer) or Furious Angel
• Caged Heat II: Stripped of Freedom (1994) (producer)
• One Man Army (1994) (producer) or Kick & Fury
• Stranglehold (1994) (producer)
• Ultimatum (1994) (producer)
• Angelfist (1993) (producer)
• Blackbelt II (1993) (producer) or Blackbelt II: Fatal Force
• Firehawk (1993) (V) (producer)
• Kill Zone (1993) (producer)
• Live by the Fist (1993) (producer)
• Blackbelt (1992) (producer) or Black Belt
• Beyond the Call of Duty (1992) (producer)
• Raiders of the Sun (1992) (producer)
• Bloodfist II
  Bloodfist II
  Bloodfist II is a 1990 action/adventure film starring Don Wilson, Kris Aguilar and Ronald Asinas. It was directed by Andy Blumenthal and written by Catherine Cyran.-Plot:...
  
  (1990) (producer)
• Dune Warriors (1990) (producer)
• Terror in Paradise (1990) (producer)
• Bloodfist
  Bloodfist
  Bloodfist is a 1989 martial arts film starring Don "The Dragon" Wilson. Wilson plays a dojo sensei in California who travels to Manila to avenge his professional kickboxer brother, who was murdered after a fight.-Plot:...
  
  (1989) (producer)
• Eye of the Eagle 2: Inside the Enemy (1989) (producer) or KIA
• Silk 2 (1989) (producer)
• Spyder (1988) (executive producer)
• Demon of Paradise (1987) (producer)
• Fast Gun (1987) (producer)
• Equalizer 2000 (1986) (producer)
• Eye of the Eagle (1986) (producer)
• Silk (1986) (producer)
• Naked Vengeance (1985) (producer) or Satin Vengeance
• Wheels of Fire (1985) (producer) or Desert Warrior or Pyro or Vindicator
• The Devastator (1985) (producer) or Kings Ransom or The Destroyers
• Maharlika (1985) (producer)
• Final Mission (1984) (producer) or Last Mission
• PX (1984) (producer)
• Stryker (1983) (producer) or Savage Dawn
• A Time for Dying (1983) (producer)
• Firecracker (1981) (producer) or Naked Fist
• Up from the Depths (1979) (producer)
• Modelong tanso (1979) (producer)
• The Muthers (1976) (producer)
• Ebony, Ivory & Jade
  Ebony, Ivory & Jade
  Ebony, Ivory & Jade is a 1976 film by director Cirio Santiago, made in Manila, Philippines. A relatively well-budgeted martial arts feature by Santiago's standards, the film was seen mainly in US drive-in movies, where it was first released as She-Devils in Chains...
  
   (1976) or She-Devils in Chains, American Beauty Hostages, Foxfire, or Foxforce
• Hustler Squad (1976) (producer)
• Cover Girl Models (1975) (producer)
• T.N.T. Jackson (1975) (producer)
• Bamboo Gods and Iron Men (1974) (producer) or Black Kung Fu (USA)
• South Seas (1974) (producer) or South Seas Massacre (Australia)
• Savage! (1973/II) (producer) or Black Valor
• Fly Me (1973) (producer)
• The Big Bird Cage (1972) (producer) or Women's Penitentiary II
• The Hot Box (1972) (producer) or Hell Cats (UK)
• Women in Cages (1971) (producer) or Women's Penitentiary III
• The Big Doll House (1971) (producer) or Bamboo Dolls House or Women's Penitentiary or Women's Penitentiary III (USA: changed title)
• The Arizona Kid (1971) (producer) or Fratelli di Arizona, I (Italy)
• Kulay Dugo ang Gabi (1966) (producer) or The Blood Drinkers (USA) or The Vampire People (USA)
• Man on the Run (1964) (producer) or The Kidnappers
• Cavalry Command (1963) (producer) or The Day of the Trumpet

Director

• Bloodfist 2050
  Bloodfist 2050
  Bloodfist 2050 is a 2005 action/adventure film directed by prolific B-movie director Cirio H. Santiago and starring Matt Mullins, Joe Sabatino, Glen Meadows and Beverly Lynne...
  
   (2005) (TV)
• When Eagles Strike
  When Eagles Strike
  When Eagles Strike is a 2003 action film starring ex-bodybuilder Christian Boeving, Stacy Keach, Nate Adams, Eddie Garcia and Monsour del Rosario. It was directed/co-produced by Cirio H. Santiago, and also shot on Philippines due to low budget....
  
   (2003)
• Aladdin and the Adventure of All Time (1999)
• Anak ng bulkan (1997)
• Nagmumurang Kamatis (1997)
• Vulcan (1997)
• Caged Heat II: Stripped of Freedom (1994) or Caged Heat 2: Stripped of Freedom (USA) or Prisoners
• One Man Army (1994) or Kick & Fury
• Stranglehold (1994)
• Ultimatum (1994)
• Angelfist (1993)
• Firehawk (1993) (V)
• Kill Zone (1993)
• Live by the Fist (1993)
• Beyond the Call of Duty (1992)
• Raiders of the Sun (1992)
• Field of Fire (1991)
• Dune Warriors (1990)
• Last Stand at Lang Mei (1990) or Eye of the Eagle 3
• Nam Angels (1989)
• Silk 2 (1989)
• The Expendables
  The Expendables (1989 film)
  The Expendables is a 1989 action film directed by Cirio H. Santiago. It stars Anthony Finetti, Peter Nelson, Loren Haynes and Kevin Duffis. It was written by Philip Alderton.Its running time is 89 minutes...
  
   (1988)
• The Sisterhood (1988/I)
• Demon of Paradise
  Demon of Paradise
  Demon of Paradise is a 1987 horror film shot in the Philippines and directed by Cirio H. Santiago. The film, along with many monster movies of the 1970s and 1980s is very similar to Jaws.-Plot:...
  
   (1987)
• Fast Gun (1987)
• Killer Instinct (1987) or Behind Enemy Lines (USA)
• Equalizer 2000
  Equalizer 2000
  Equalizer 2000, also known as Defender 2000, is a 1986 action movie, filmed in the Philippines, featuring an early appearance by Robert Patrick from Terminator 2: Judgment Day fame...
  
   (1986)
• Eye of the Eagle (1986)
• Future Hunters (1986) or Deadly Quest or Spear of Destiny
• Silk (1986)
• Naked Vengeance (1985) or Satin Vengeance
• Wheels of Fire (1985) or Desert Warrior or Pyro or Vindicator
• The Devastator (1985) or Kings Ransom or The Destroyers
• Final Mission (1984) or Last Mission
• Caged Fury (1983)
• Stryker (1983) or Savage Dawn (video title)
• Firecracker (1981) or Naked Fist
• Machete Maidens of Mora Tao (1981)
• Ang Galing-galing mo, Mrs. Jones (1980)
• Kasal-kasalan, Bahay-bahayan (1979)
• Modelong Tanso (1979)
• Death Force (1978) or Fierce or Fighting Mad
• Vampire Hookers (1978) or Cemetery Girls or Ladies of the Night or Night of the Bloodsuckers or Sensuous Vampires or Twice Bitten
• Hell Hole (1978) or Escape from Women's Hell Hole (USA) or Women of Hell's Island
• The Muthers (1976)
• Ebony, Ivory & Jade
  Ebony, Ivory & Jade
  Ebony, Ivory & Jade is a 1976 film by director Cirio Santiago, made in Manila, Philippines. A relatively well-budgeted martial arts feature by Santiago's standards, the film was seen mainly in US drive-in movies, where it was first released as She-Devils in Chains...
  
   (1976) or She-Devils in Chains, American Beauty Hostages, Foxfire, or Foxforce
• Cover Girl Models (1975)
• T.N.T. Jackson (1975)
• Savage! (1973/II) or Black Valor
• Fly Me (1973)
• Carnival Song (1973)
• Darna at ang Babaeng Tuod (1964) or Darna and the Tree Monster

Writer

• Operation Balikatan (2003)
• Anak ng bulkan (1997) (story)
• Vulcan (1997) (story)
• Silk (1986) (story)
• Time for Dying (1983)
• Firecracker (1981) or Naked Fist
• Hell Hole (1978) or Escape from Women's Hell Hole (USA) or Women of Hell's Island

External links