Uppers, downers in 2014

CONEY Reyes

Now that’s Show Biz Year 2014 is down to its last two minutes (months, actually), it’s time to look back and cite the season’s top uppers and downers, as far as quality or the absence of it is concerned.

Positively speaking (we must all be relentlessly optimistic, despite many temptations and seductions to the contrary), we thank our indie filmmakers for bravely forging ahead, despite the general lack of support, producing movies that have won honors both here and internationally.

On the “maindie” film scene, props go to Chito Roño and Star Cinema for “The Trial.” Let’s hope (against hope?) that another worthy film will join it on our “best of 2014” list after the Metro Manila Film Festival next month.

AMY AUSTRIA

Also a definite plus for 2014 was the importance that the season’s productions gave to our best senior stars, whose well-honed talents were showcased in many significant TV-film projects, in which they played key roles.

Coney Reyes, Amy Austria, Joel Torre, Ronaldo Valdez, Robert Arevalo, Tirso Cruz III, Tommy Abuel and other senior players were thus given the rare opportunity to remind viewers that they’re still very much around, and can act circles around their younger and rawer counterparts!

We hope that, in 2015, this trend will be taken one step further, and senior stars will get to play lead roles in their very own films and teleseryes. If the mature likes of Clint Eastwood and Meryl Streep can do it, their local counterparts can, too!

Easy, lazy

On the other hand, 2014 had its share of disappointments, led by the relative dud that Marian Rivera’s much-hyped dance showcase sadly turned

TOMMY Abuel

out to be. The lovely and sexy star simply opted to take it easy and even lazy, and not all of the window-dressing and psychological photoshopping in the world could distract viewers from the fact that the self-styled “dance diva” wasn’t all that ready and willing—to break out into sweat!

Also sadly not up to snuff was the actual achievement of the similarly excessively-hyped “heroic teleserye,” “Ilustrado,” which was hobbled by a bad case of miscasting (the tisoy and bedimpled Alden Richards as Jose Rizal). Despite a big budget, lofty ambitions and some well-executed sequences, the series was decidedly a less than “heroic” achievement, and all too soon concluded its relatively unfocused and insufficiently insightful storytelling.

TIRSO Cruz III

Still, GMA 7 should be credited for daring to aim so high—and we can only hope that it will eventually come up with another culturally and historically significant project—with better artists in charge, to succeed in coaxing it to full fruition. Why not a Ninoy Aquino, Cory Aquino or Ninoy-Cory teleserye—done very insightfully and well?

Another downer this show biz year that’s about to end has been the relatively slim pickings in terms of “deserving” new stars that have been given their big breaks in TV and film productions.

Most of the new stars and production headliners launched have been embarrassingly not ready for genuine stardom. What a waste

JOEL Torre

of opportunity and exposure!

Our studios really have to beef up their training processes, so that when important projects need new stars, the lucky talents they tap are good and ready!