What Sleeps Beneath is an online magazine that explores the horror genre as one of the most important cultural vehicles of our time. It is a home for all horror-loving nerds, and a space to investigate what the genre tells us about ourselves. We write book and movie reviews, conduct interviews, and write original academic research.

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Harri Chan 8/10/26 Harri Chan 8/10/26

The Manananggal: Monstrous Femininity, Colonialism, and Filipino Identity in Cinema

Within Filipino folklore, no creature captivates and horrifies like the viscera-sucker, or manananggal. In Ramos’s taxonomy of aswangs, they are typically portrayed as beautiful women with long hair who, by night, split at the waist and detach from their lower body, hiding it in a safe place, such as under a banana tree. The top half sprouts wings and takes to the night to hunt for prey, intestines flying behind her.