[2] It stars Tommy Abuel, Mario Montenegro, and Charo Santos in her acting debut, and follows a young photographer who encounters a mysterious woman whilst visiting his father in San Ildefonso during Lent.

Itim addresses the topics of occultism and religion in a "foray into gothic horror, exploring the spiritual nature of life and people in the quiet little town of San Ildefonso".

Originally a cinematographer, Mike de Leon was known for his award-winning work on the 1975 film Manila in the Claws of Light, which was directed by Lino Brocka.

[12] Initially, de Leon, as he explains in a 2022 interview, was interested in casting big-name actors, as was the common practice at the time in Indonesian film.

[13] De Leon recalled approaching Rolando Tinio, his former teacher, to discuss whether his wife, actress Ella Luansing, would play the espiritista in the film.

"[5] Itim is regarded as the first major production design work of Chionglo, who would later go on to be a respected director in his own right, best known for the trilogy consisting of Sibak, Burlesk King, and Twilight Dancers.

[10] The film also served as the first cinematography work of Rody Lacap, a former color grader and optical print operator at LVN Pictures.

He would go on to be the cinematographer of several of de Leon's other films, including Kakabakaba Ka Ba?, Kisapmata, Batch '81, and Sister Stella L., as well as Peque Gallaga's Oro, Plata, Mata and Marilou Diaz-Abaya's José Rizal.

[21] Lacap was co-cinematographer with Ely Cruz, who also worked with de Leon on Monologo, and would go on to photograph Peque Gallaga's Scorpio Nights, among others.

[22] Santos described de Leon on set as seeing "a genius in action",[10] adding: "He storyboarded the entire movie in his head, even before the first shot.

[10] The more experienced Tommy Abuel also recalled that de Leon "was mainly concerned with the technical aspects of the film such as camera angles, shots, lighting, etc.

[10] In order to achieve a bleak and moody atmosphere, de Leon used various post-production techniques that imagined the cinematography's darkness as a protagonist, including exposing the negatives twice.

"[8] Regarding the categorization of Itim as a horror film, de Leon explained that he accepted it, and added that others influences included Nicholas Roeg's Don't Look Now, that he had watched "in Germany in the mid-1970s",[25] and Jack Clayton's The Innocents, that he had found extremely "frightening" and praised greatly.

"[26] The final scene occurs during Good Friday, which Lim suggested meant the story falls short of the redemption symbolized by Easter Sunday and thus "closes on the darkness of death, remorse, and frailty named in its title.

[30] These allusions, theologist Antonio Sison contended, are presented through the lens of "folk Catholic imaginary", that blends images of Catholicism with the Filipino primal religion.

"[32] The topic is thus approached with seriousness and confers a certain religious legitimacy to the practices of spiritism, distinguishing the séances in Itim from other depictions of such scenes in horror film.

Sison commented: "The folk Catholic imagery recognizes the divine intervention of religious images who will use dreamscape as a means to interrupt sinful patterns in the characters' lives and make metanoia a possibility, or, at least, a promise.

A French retrospective presentation found that the typically Filipino syncretism of mysticism and Christianity is visible in the film through certain stylistic choices: "Itim shines with this singular harmony of gentleness and fear, of magical realism and spectral fantasy.

The Italian film laboratory L'Immagine Ritrovata restored these qualities to their proper depth, soaking the viewers in a bath of voluminous, deliberate color, light, and shadow.

[37] A presentation of the film at the MoMa stated that Itim expressed its director's "fears" about "the dark side" of culture in the Philippines, namely "the Spanish colonial legacies of superstition and antiscience".

The crazy thing is that we invited them back.”[39] A 2023 French review of the DVD version wrote that Mike de Leon used "fantasy [...] as the only way of justice for a violence that is sadly concrete and inscribed in the mores of this patriarchal society.

[17] In November that same year, the restored film was included in the "Mike De Leon, Self-Portrait of a Filipino Filmmaker" retrospective at the Museum of Modern Art in New York City.

[13] The following month, Itim was shown in another retrospective, "Mike de Leon: A Life in (Moving) Pictures" at the Three Continents Festival in Nantes, France.

[49] In a mixed retrospective review for AsianMoviePlus, however, Don Anelli criticized the "unnecessary technical flourishes" and the "slow-burn" pace of the film, and stated that Itim was a "generally enjoyable if somewhat flawed supernatural effort".

[4] Mike de Leon's sophomore feature, Kung Mangarap Ka't Magising, as well as Eddie Romero's Ganito Kami Noon... Paano Kayo Ngayon?