And the winner is...

“Snubbed” by the jurors is how one entertainment website dismissed the non-inclusion of Aga Muhlach, Eugene Domingo and Gladys Reyes among the nominees in the acting categories at the 27 December awards night of the ongoing 2024 Metro Manila Film Festival.

The actors were most-likely not snubbed.

For background, Uninvited had a total of seven nominations, compared to the 15 (the highest) of The Kingdom, and one of Viva films’ Hold Me Close, as an automatic nomination of Best Picture for each of the 10 entries.

It is most likely that they didn’t make it to the Top six in terms of juror votes for the actors considered for a specific category. Only the top six are considered nominees. If there’s a tie for the sixth slot, both could be included as nominees. The tie may be broken by the chairman of the board if doing so is in the rules they have agreed upon before they started voting for the nominees. The jurors, though, may also agree among themselves not to break any ties in all the categories. Obviously judging to choose nominees and winners is a collegial act.

We’re making this informed “guess” as to why actors with a track record of triumphs in award events “mysteriously” (suspiciously?) didn’t make it to the nominees’ list in specific categories based on our experience as a voting member of two showbiz reporters groups in the past that give out movie awards: the Entertainment Press Society (Enpress) and the Philippine Movie Press Club.

Noel Ferrer, the MMFF publicist since 2016, recently posted in his Facebook the names of the 13 jurors who deliberated on the 10 MMFF 2024 entries, chose six nominees per category, tackled the merits and demerits of each portrayal, and then cast their votes. The final winner was, of course, the one with the most number of votes. All-in-all, it took almost eight hours of deliberations — from 9 a.m. to 4:30 p.m. on 27 December.

Ferrer asserted on his Facebook on 28 December: “YOU MAY AGREE OR DISAGREE WITH THEIR CHOICES [the caps are his — for emphasis] … but the integrity of each and every member of the Jury since we took charge in 2016, especially on this 50th Edition of the MMFF cannot be assailed.

“They have exhaustively deliberated and decided on the nominees and the winners from 9 a.m. to -4:30 p.m. yesterday… No leaks, definitely no cooking show… only the jury chair and the MMFF executive director (lawyer Don Artes) knew the results, not even I or any member of the Execom.

“Rest assured, there was due process and the judgment was fair and sound AND FINAL!!!”

The board of jurors was headed by the University of the Philippines’ Film Institute professor emeritus Nicanor Tiongson. Its members were Film Development Council of the Philippines’ chair Jose Javier “Joey” Reyes, Budget Secretary Amenah Pangandaman, actor John Arcilla, Film Academy of the Philippines’ director general Paolo Villaluna, award-winning screenwriter Roy Iglesias, producer Jesse Ejercito, entertainment journalist Marinel Cruz, cinematographer Videlle “Lee” Briones-Meilly, businessman Thomas Orbos, Metra Manila Development Council director Cesar Ona Jr., IAcademy president Racquel Wong and Robinsons Movieworld operations director Evylene Advincula.

The names of the jurors were not announced during the awards night and their presence was also not acknowledged. Their identities were first revealed by Ferrer in his Facebook post.

Reyes has directed Aga Muhlach many times during the actor’s younger years and those movies include MMFF entries for which Muhlach won at the festival twice. It is unthinkable that the lead actor of this year’s very prominent entry, Uninvited, was not considered at all to be a nominee.

Muhlach, seemingly for the first time, portrayed a man who is totally devoid of moral scruples and he did it suavely, cooly. As a wealthy businessman engaged in illegal ventures, possibly even immoral, he ordered his men one fine night to pick up a decent young woman in town who he could ravish that night in his bedroom, which he seems not to share with his wife (Mylene Dizon) and whom he knows to be messing around with one of his young and equally conscience-less henchmen portrayed by RK Bagatsing.

It’s very possible that some of the jurors spoke well during the deliberations for the merits of Dan Villegas’ helming of Uninvited but he lost in the voting for best director, which was awarded to Michael Tuviera for his work in The Kingdom and to Crisanto Aquino for My Future You. Yes, it was a tie.

An entry had two nominees for Best Actor: Vic Sotto and Piolo Pascual of The Kingdom. You know by now, of course, that the winner is Dennis Trillo for Green Bones. One actor, Sid Lucero, is nominated twice as best supporting actor, for his performance in The Kingdom and Topakk. His two nominations may have reduced his votes for each entry. The winning number of votes were cast in favor of Ruru Madrid for his performance as a jail warden in Green Bones. Trillo portrayed one of the prisoners in that provincial jail.

Vilma Santos, who portrays the avenging mother of the raped and murdered young woman, got into the rank of nominees for best actress.

Olea quoted Santos in their Troika column at PEP.ph website on 29 December as saying it does not bother her at all that she did not win and Uninvited won only one award (best float, in a tie with Topakk) because her advocacy in joining the MMFF this year is to attract the people back in movie houses, as well as to restore “glitz and glamor” in movie affairs.

Santos saw dozens of glamorously attired actors, film producers, and other film company executives at the Solaire ballroom that night. Indeed, it’s nice to know that Pinoy actors can glitter and glow even if they did not win any award or were not even nominated for any award.