The 28th Gawad Urian list of nominees

[jenny]

The 28th Gawad Urian list of nominees
STARBYTES By Butch Francisco
The Philippine Star 04/28/2005

After the controversy-laden Star Awards for Movies last March, the awards season is again in full swing – with the Film Academy Awards (to be produced again by Albert Martinez) rolling out the red carpet once more on May 14.

This weekend, the FAMAS was supposed to hold its awards ceremonies, except that Airtime Marketing, Inc. producer Tessie Celestino decided to postpone it (to June 19) since practically all of the stars will be out of town (mostly in Cebu) participating either in GMA 7’s Kapuso Fans’ Day or in ABS-CBN’s summer caravan.

Two weeks before the FAMAS show on June 19, however, the Manunuri ng Pelikulang Pilipino will be staging first the 28th Gawad Urian, which will be held at the AFP Theater in Camp Aguinaldo, Quezon City on June 4. Mr. Tony Tuviera’s APT Entertainment will again produce the event for television (on RPN-9).

At the moment, the Manunuri members and the APT production staff (headed by executive producer Malou Choa f*gar – with Poochie Rivera as director) are already working on the concept of the show – to be hosted by Janno Gibbs, Michael V. and Pia Guanio.

From the Manunuri’s end, the members had just finalized its list of nominees and I am sharing the list with you below:

Best Picture – Ebolusyon ng Isang Pamilyang Pilipino (Paul Tanedo, producer), Milan (Star Cinema Productions, Inc.), Panaghoy sa Suba (CM Films, Inc.) and Sabel (Regal Entertainment, Inc.).

Best Director – Lav Diaz (Ebolusyon), Joel Lamangan (Sabel), Olivia Lamasan (Milan) and Cesar Montano (Panaghoy).

Best Screenplay — Lav Diaz (Ebolusyon), Raymond Lee and Olivia Lamasan (Milan), Ricardo Lee (Sabel) and Cris Vertido (Panaghoy).

Best Actor – Ronnie Lazaro and Pen Medina (Ebolusyon), Cesar Montano (Panaghoy), Piolo Pascual (Milan), Yul Servo (Naglalayag) and Jomari Yllana (Minsan Pa).

Best Actress – Nora Aunor (Naglalayag), Claudine Barretto (Milan), Judy Ann Santos (Sabel) and Vilma Santos (Mano Po 3; My Love).

Best Supporting Actor – Wendel Ramos (Sabel), Roeder (Ebolusyon), Dennis Trillo (Aishite Masu) and Jacky Woo (Panaghoy).

Best Suporting Actress – Iza Calzado (Sigaw), Aleck Bovick (Naglalayag), Angie Ferro (Ebolusyon), Rebecca Lusterio (Panaghoy), Ara Mina (Minsan Pa) and Julian Palermo (Panaghoy).

Best Cinematography – Bahaghari, Larry Manda and Paul Tanedo (Ebolusyon), Shayne Clemente (Milan), Ely Cruz (Panaghoy) and Ja Tadena (Pa-siyam).

Best Editing – Jason, Cahapay (Pa-siyam), Vito Cajili (Feng Shui), Marya Ignacio (Milan) and Renato de Leon (Panaghoy).

Best Production Design – Patty Eustaquio, Rishab and Jun Sabayton (Ebolusyon), Allan Leyres and Ron Heritan (Panaghoy) and Richard Somes (Pa-siyam).

Best Music – Nonong Buencamino (Panaghoy), Lucien Lataba and Arnel de Pano (Minsan Pa) and Jesse Lucas (Sabel).

Best Sound – Albert Michael Idioma (Feng Shui), Rafael Luna and Bob Macabenta (Ebolusyon), Arnold Reodica (Sigaw), Angie Reyes and Nestor Mutia (Panaghoy) and Ramon Reyes (Pa-siyam).

[fairy]

Tnx love for posting! Sana manalo Si Dine!

Lets all pray for her!

[petmama]

Hey thanks for that post love.

Naku, akala ko di nominated si Nora & Vi. I think tagilid uli ang lagay ni Claudine, but won't it be super nice if she wins?

Wow, daming noms for Milan.

[admin]

nomination with those veteran actresses is enough honor i think

[petmama]

Jennina said:

nomination with those veteran actresses is enough honor i think

I agree Jen, however, it would be an absolute coup & validation for Claudine if she wins this one against those 2 vets. I hope they'll give Claudine her due.

[admin]

haha yeah petmama .. maybe now is the time ... i hope.
but we know those voters in those awards shows, they are biased.

[petmama]

Gosh, I was just thinking how big that would be if Claudine wins against Nora, Vi & Juday.

[admin]

haha petmama, after the luna awards .. its not so impossible anymore

[ialsa]

anothe trophy for dine.

[petmama]

Jen - you could be right. Claudine will now have a very good chance at winning the Urian for sure. What a pre-wedding gift this is going to be for her.

[admin]

haha yeah ..
but the luna awards suffice .. aba, first award nila yun so history si dine and the other winners
another one is an icing on the cake though

[petmama]

Oh yeah.

[admin]

Tight race for Urian Best Actress
Posted 01:05am (Mla time) May 27, 2005
Inquirer News Service

Editor's Note: Published on page A3-4 of the May 27, 2005 issue of the Philippine Daily Inquirer


WILL Nora Aunor win Best Actress for "Naglalayag" and finally be just one trophy shy of Vilma Santos' record of eight trophies in the Gawad Urian?

But Santos may improve her position as the "winningest" actress in the Gawad Urian if she wins for the romantic hit, "Mano Po 3: My Love."

Gawad Urian is given out by the Manunuri ng Pelikulang Pilipino, a society of respected film critics.


The score

So far, the score is 8-6, in favor of Vilma Santos.

Aunor was the first Urian Best Actress in 1976, winning for her role in Mario O'Hara's "Tatlong Taong Walang Diyos."

She repeated the feat in 1980 for Lino Brocka's "Bona"; in 1989 for Elwood Perez's "Bilanging ang Bituin sa Langit"; in 1990 for Gil Portes' "Andrea, Paano ba ang Maging Isang Ina?"; in 1995 for Joel Lamangan's "The Flor Contemplacion Story" (she won all the Best Actress awards that year for the same movie); and in 1996 for Lamangan's "Bakit May Kahapon Pa?"

In 1982, Santos won her first Urian as Best Actress for her role in Ishmael Bernal's "Relasyon." That year, she scored the first grand slam of any actress in Philippine entertainment history.

The following year, she won the Urian again for Bernal's "Broken Marriage"; and again the next year, for Mike de Leon's "Sister Stella L."

Santos closed the 1980's by winning in 1989 for Bernal's "Pahiram ng Isang Umaga."

She won for Eddie Garcia's "Ipagpatawad Mo" in 1991, Laurice Guillen's "Dahil Mahal Kita: The Dolzura Cortez Story" in 1993, and Chito Roño's "Bata, Bata, Paano Ka Ginawa?" in 1998.

Santos last won the Urian in 2002 for Rono's "Dekada '70."

In this year's race, Aunor has the more audacious role. In "Naglalayag," she portrays a judge scorned by society for falling in love with a younger man.

But Santos delivers a confident performance as a Chinese-Filipino woman who reunites with an old flame.


Claudine vs Judy Ann
But the rug may be pulled from under the great duo by either of two rising young actresses, Claudine Barretto and Judy Ann Santos.

Barretto is nominated for her portrayal of a woman dealing smartly and bravely with the vagaries of expatriate life in the movie, "Milan." Judy Ann Santos is cited for her daring turn as a latent lesbian in "Sabel."


Also exciting
The Best Actor category is just as exciting.

Cesar Montano is nominated as a Boholano amid the ravages of World War II in "Panaghoy sa Suba," the dramatic epic he produced and directed. The film is nominated for Best Picture and Montano is also nominated for Best Director.

Ronnie Lazaro and Pen Medina are cited for "Ebolusyon ng Isang Pamilyang Pilipino," the 10-hour digital epic by Lav Diaz. Lazaro is nominated for playing the role of a hard-up miner while Medina is cited for his role as an unlikely assassin.

Jomari Yllana is nominated for his sensitive portrayal of a tourist guide in the face of the deceptive tourism gains of Cebu in "Minsan Pa."


Yul vs Piolo
Yul Servo is nominated for his role as Aunor's young lover in "Naglalayag." Piolo Pascual is cited for his moving performance as a man in search of his lost wife in Italy in "Milan."

The winners will be known during the colorful 28th Gawad Urian awarding ceremonies on June 4 at the AFP Theater. The production is produced by APT Productions and will be aired on GMA-7.

The Manunuri ng Pelikulang Pilipino is chaired by Lito B. Zulueta, arts and culture editor of the Philippine Daily Inquirer and professor of journalism, literature and film theory at the University of Santo Tomas.

Manunuri members are Dean Nicanor Tiongson of the University of the Philippines College of Mass Communication; Magsaysay laureate Bienvenido Lumbera; TV host and Philippine Star columnist Butch Francisco; Mario Hernando, Sunday Malaya editor and Movie and Television Review and Classification Board member; Prof. Gigi Javier-Alfonso of the UP-CMC film department and the UP Open University; Prof. Mike Rapatan of the De la Salle University Department of Communications; and Prof. Rolando Tolentino of the UP Film Institute.

[admin]

Milan, Sabel make a credible case for Urian best picture
Posted 11:01pm (Mla time) May 29, 2005
By Lito B. Zulueta
Inquirer News Service

Editor's Note: Published on page G1 of the May 30, 2005 issue of the Philippine Daily Inquirer.


THE FILIPINO expatriate life in Italy gets a scenic, glossy but realistic treatment in "Milan," which is arguably the most successful Filipino movie of 2004, scoring very well both in the box office and in critical approbation.

Directed by Olivia Lamasan and written by Raymond Lee, "Milan" (Star Cinema) is an engaging, totally affecting survey of the Filipino migrant worker experience in Europe. Filipinos will find this tale of Lino (Piolo Pascual) looking for his missing wife (Iza Calzado) in Italy, and meeting there a street-smart, self-driven but emotionally scarred domestic helper, Jenny (Claudine Barretto), quite familiar and recognizable. It is the tale of tens of thousands of other Filipinos who risk safety and family togetherness to eke out a living in uncertain climates abroad. The predictable postcard-pretty romance that happens between the two merely provides an interesting sheen that perhaps subdues the harsher aspects of the diaspora. But the result is nothing bland or evasive. "Milan" is a compelling romance.

For its success in melding commercial and artistic concerns into one powerful movie, "Milan" is nominated for best picture in the 28th Gawad Urian, the prize given out for excellence in filmmaking by the Manunuri ng Pelikulang Pilipino.


Careful characterization
Part of the realism of "Milan" owes to the careful characterization and portrayal of Filipino migrant workers' lives in Europe. When Lino finds in the city slicker Jenny a guide to the devious alleys of Milan and expatriate living, he discovers the milieu in which Filipino workers' dreams and aspirations thrive or fail: In the large apartment she shares with other workers, he finds intertwining lives that somehow shame his rather narrow preoccupation with searching for his wife-a couple carrying on an affair without the knowledge of their spouses back home and agonizing over what to do with her unwanted pregnancy, a tomboy toughening herself for more challenges ahead, and a former low-class entertainer who pines for her old days of glory as a cheap entertainer.

Then there's Jenny. Her hard exterior and self-driven ways mask her hurts and frustrations. Perhaps reveling in her relative success in Italy, she finds in the hapless Lino a plaything with which to measure her sheer accomplishment of having survived in a cutthroat world. But the more she raises the roof of her self-importance, the more she finds herself returning to the old scenes of her defeats and losses. In the hands of Barretto, who is nominated as best actress, the character is mesmerizing.

But the more engaging character, of course, is Lino, the pathetic husband who doesn't exactly find his missing wife, as much ending up in a more problematic romance with Jenny. The character is very credible-resistant at first to humiliating himself by doing menial work in Italy, then coming to his own as he establishes himself with that peculiar Filipino temper of bluff and arrogance. As he forgets what he has come for Italy for in the first place, we find him going deeper into emotional turmoil. In the end, he discovers that it is himself that has been lost.

It is a difficult role that could have been trivialized or made even more pathetic by a lesser actor, but in the hands of Piolo Pascual, who is nominated for best actor, it becomes a totally sincere creation. Pascual has always delivered sensitive portrayals, but this is his best performance so far because he was able to carve it with the right balance of sheer physicality and raw emotion, really his best assets as an actor.

Lamasan and Lee temper the romantic thrust with documentary flair, showing footages of interviews with Filipino workers in Italy. Even Lino gets subsumed in the documentary sequences, a melding of truth and fiction. In the end, "Milan" is totally true and disarming. The romance is merely the canvas on which to paint a resonant picture of the Filipino's banishment from his homeland.


'Sabel'

If there's banishment in "Sabel," it is banishment from gender. Produced by Regal Films, written by Ricardo Lee and directed by Joel Lamangan, the movie is perhaps the most shocking movie last year for its theme of latent lesbianism. Its audacity in tackling a very sensitive matter has moved the Manunuri to nominate it as best picture in the Gawad Urian.

Sabel (Judy Ann Santos) is a nun working in the prison ministry where she catches the attention of Jojo (Wendell Ramos), a man wrongly convicted for a crime. In the oppressiveness of prison, he rapes her. He falls in love with her and released from jail, he looks for her. His search enables him to piece together fragments of her very enigmatic life.

"Sabel" is an intriguing movie that may disappoint some because the movie hovers between answering the riddle of Sabel and altogether evading it, much like a person evading questions about her sexuality. It seems in fact to depend too much on the reaction of the audience to accept Sabel's mystery as a given in a world where nothing is really determined nor defined.

For example, the audience is at a loss on how Sabel, who is revealed to have been a problem child in the past with a record of casual sex encounters, could have suddenly become a nun. The character is simply bereft of a religious sensibility. In the same vein, the movie does not explain her sudden altruism when she gives herself up to her rapist. The movie denies all the salient epiphanies so that when she suddenly hooks up with a lesbian doctor serving the indigenous people of the Mountain Province, the audience feels her decision as one of those remote, inexplicable decisions she made in the past. "Sabel" is a character movie with less than a believable character.

Despite its shortcomings, "Sabel" is absorbing to watch because of its assay at the riddle of sexuality as well as the performance of Judy Ann Santos, who is nominated for best actress. "Sabel" is Santos' first major acting achievement in her long career.

The other best picture nominees are Cesar Montano's "Panaghoy sa Suba" (CM Films) and Lav Diaz's "Ebolusyon ng Isang Pamilyang Pilipino" (Paul Tanedo Inc.). The 28th Gawad Urian will be held on June 4 at the AFP Theater. Produced by APT Productions, the ceremonies will be broadcast on Channel 9. Sponsors are Revicon, Procter & Gamble, Unilab and Unilever.

[petmama]

Alin ba talaga ang equivalent sa Oscar sa mga award giving bodies diyan? Ang Luna ba? O ang Urian?