Old movie love teams never die

Old soldiers aren’t the only elderly entities who never die, popular love teams of the silver or slivered screen appear to be similarly exempt from the tides and ides of “forgets and regrets.”

Take the once popular love team of Guy and Pip—don’t look now, but 40 years after the fact, Nora Aunor and Tirso Cruz III are still being regarded as ripe and ready for their nth comeback to the movie or TV screen as a romantic or post-romantic pair of senior lovers.

Beating that tautological tandem to the draw is Nora’s other pairing with Christopher de Leon on their recent TV5 soap, “Sa Ngalan ng Ina.” Guy and Pip diehards may  resolutely claim that their favored pairing is more popular, but the pro-Boyet camp can even more lustily point out that, once upon a time on a romantic beach, Nora and Christopher actually got married to each other.

That stellar union didn’t last, of course, but it did produce a son, Ian—who is in case you’re interested in amazing and even discombobulating trivia, made his comeback to acting as his mother’s duplicitous bodyguard and assassin in her mini-series. But, that’s another story.

Another popular love team that show-biz observers expect to eventually make a “reunion” movie is that of Sharon Cuneta and Gabby Concepcion. Like Nora and Boyet, Sharon and Gabby were once a married couple, and that union produced show-biz princess KC (who, we trust, won’t agree to playing her mother’s killer in a future photoplay—after all, Ian has already beaten her to the punch, stab and shot).

It’s obvious that Gabby wants to revive his stellar career, and that a reunion team-up with Sharon will help firm it up, but Sharon isn’t fast-tracking that project—yet.

First, she needs to get back to fighting trim, then there’s her costarring project with Vilma Santos that she’s already agreed to do—so, in the meantime, Gabby’s handlers should line up other attention-calling movies for him, like a father-daughter team-up with KC.

Among all of the love team comebacks “cooking” on local producers’ stoves, the most exciting prospect is the new Dawn Zulueta-Richard Gomez romantic-drama series that’s being promoted as a TV version of their hit film, “Hihintayin Kita sa Langit,” shot in achingly scenic Batanes two decades ago.

Both Dawn and Richard have more or less retained their looks, so fans are raring to get swept away again by their romantic scenes—in a more mature vein, of course.

Other veteran screen tandems that could still ring viewers’ bells include Vilma-Christopher, Sharon-Richard, Susan Roces-Eddie Gutierrez—and (we can dream, can’t we?) Gloria Romero and Eddie Garcia in a comedy-drama about still swinging seniors.

That sounds really far-out, but with the right script and director, it could just give today’s viewers the “different” kind of viewing treat they seem to be looking for.