Rockland County based mixed Filipino filmmaker, Pushing through the pandemic with passion

Photo of Mena Guy

After starting out in a student film class at RCC, Mena Guy has become a successful writer, director, storyteller, and film producer based in Rockland County. She currently works at Tegmental, a video production company that offers creative services to other artists and people who need creative direction and input. Guy has worked with notable performers, including Korn, Iron Maiden, and KISS.

Guy currently works alongside producer, Mike Canale. Canale and Guy are the first male and female Filipino duo to work together in the American horror film world.

The dynamic combo found it very comforting to work together right off the bat as they both struggle with pushing through society’s cultural identity issues. Guy is Filipino and French, and Canale is a Filipino adopted into an Italian-American family.

Matt and Mena

The film pair have teamed up to address cultural identities and bring more social awareness to those issues through their own artwork.

So, how did Guy exactly get herself into the film industry? It all started in the pandemic. Guy was just hired by a company that first requested her to learn web design. However, due to the pandemic, the company was left with no choice but to let her go. Eager to learn, she created a blog out of her skills that eventually led her down a more indecent path.

Despite facing setbacks,  Guy remained determined to go the extra mile to prove herself during that turbulent time. That’s when she decided to create her very own horror blog, Church of Mena, which is now an own entertainment brand that is available on YouTube. Additionally, without any prior marketing experience, Guy was able to raise 30K for the film project, “Meals To Die For” during the pandemic.

“I would like to inspire any filmmakers in Rockland to make those stories, produce their films — and even contact me if you want to collaborate or work together for films. We need more of a community like that in Rockland,” said Guy.

When the company let her go, it forced her into freelancing and branding herself as a horror filmmaker, which blossomed her capabilities during the pandemic. She saw it as her own silver lining, which eventually became a snowball effect that took her career to new heights.

Mena covers true crime, horror movies, etc., all under one umbrella on her blog. “The opportunity opened so many new doors for not only me but for others,” said Guy. “You know what they say, the best revenge is massive success,” She enjoys being able to not only grow in her field but to help other like-minded creators flourish as well.

“When you get knocked down by life, you can either let that define you and suffer with it, or you can look at those hardships and only go up from there and create something out of nothing,” said Guy. “You don’t really have too much to lose, so why not just do it?” She explained the snowball effect as she was building herself from the bottom.

Guy describes the effect as she visualizes herself at rock bottom, and all that she has is a tiny snowball. She then starts to climb back up the mountain. Once she arrived at the top of the mountain, her snowball became more significant in size until it eventually fell down the other side of the hill and grew independently. She sees the snowball effects as a mirrored experience of developing her blog. Guy transformed her quarantine hobby into an entertainment brand, increasing exponentially on YouTube.

To check out Guy’s entertainment blog “Church of Mena”, you can view her Youtube channel at: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCocQAq4J9v5p6-4p3S5zp5g.

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