As an armed group masquerading as environmentalists infiltrates a community of miners, the village captain, Kapitana, rushes to secure a permit that would allow them to keep their livelihood in mining.

The film is about the lives of simple folk caught between the crossfire of Kapitana accused of political patronage, and Patrol Kalikasan using the environment as a front for their own political and economic interests on the small mining community. As the provincial government and the Department of Environment and Natural Resources (DENR) fight over the jurisdiction over small-scale mining operations, Elmer and Linda suffer the devastating consequences of the legacy of violence and corruption of the country's turbulent political and ideological history.—akosijesu

While the film was inspired by true events, ORO depicts the transition of one community's economic and political systems. Economically, from the people's communal ownership of the natural resources, it turned into capitalism where the people owned only their labor. Politically, from a benevolent feudalistic leadership of Kapitana it turned into a cruel fascist regime of the bigger politicians. While the real story was "killed" in media, the film was censored too when it was pulled out of the theaters. Guns and goons have many faces but the GOLD in Oro prevails. Censorship haunts all of us and our society yet this MASTERPIECE continues to live on to immortalize the plea of the murdered four small-scale miners for justice. MMFF 2016 Best Actress Irma Adlawan with the MMFF 2016 Best Ensemble Cast were truly deserving of the laurels. Writer and Director Alvin Yapan and Executive Producer Shandii Bacolod were excellent too as this creation heals a community that has been deprived of fairness and equal opportunities.