My Film 100 professor had said that when you see Vilma Santos in person, it's really hard not to get starstruck with her stellar appeal. UP Diliman Chancellor Francis Sergio Cao agrees. In his opening remarks at the Gawad Plaridel 2005 Awarding and Lecture, he confessed it was still his first time to see the famed actress in person and just how "starstruck" he was to be near her (two seats away); yeah, I could almost hear him jittering.

Well, good for them; they got to be a meter or two away from this still-youthful-even-in-her-golden-age film icon. Me, the closest that I could get was just around 8-10 meters. I was in awe, of course, to have seen one of my favorite older actresses. But not much awe for me to be considered starstruck. I was just way beyond the "Starstruck Radius".

Multi-awarded Filipino actress Vilma Santos is this year's UP Gawad Plaridel awardee. The UP College of Mass Communication (my college!) gave her this award for her innumerable and invaluable contribution to the film industry, and mass communication as a whole. Santos was given the award at the Cine Adarna (formerly UP Film Center) just this afternoon, where she also delivered a half-hour lecture, reminiscing her almost fifty-year life as an actress and speaking strongly against the problems that plague the film industry today (lets give one of them a name: piracy).

Ms. Santos' speech, for me, was very profound and candid. I always had great respect and admiration for her as a person, public servant, and actress. After the lecture, that respect and admiration hot-air-ballooned. It became clear to me that even if this person is now worthy of having a constellation named after her, she is still as human and feet-on-the-ground as possible. During the reminiscing part of her speech, she told us about her humble beginnings as an artist, and about her mistakes and the challenges that spiced up her life. There was that time, she confided, when she had just won grandslam best actress and she was filming another movie and she sort of..."laxed" a bit. Her director, whom she had previously worked with, scolded her saying, "di dahil nanalo ka na ng grandslam e magaling ka na!" The director had Vilma Santos jog for 10 minutes to awaken her from her "illusion."

But aside from Vilma Santos, many prominent people were also present in the occasion. Here's a list of those I can remember:

Sen. Ralph Recto (ang "maybahay")
UP President Emerlinda Roman
National Artist Napoleon Abueva (who sculpted the Gawad Plaridel trophy)
ABS-CBN boss Charo Santos-Concio
Eugenia Apostol (Philippine Daily Inquirer founding chairperson and last year's Gawad Plaridel awardee)
Film director Chito Roņo

Members of the media were also there. I even got to see Mario Dumaual, that showbiz reporter in ABS-CBN! It was him whom I got to see closest; he and his crew were shooting a mere meter in front of me. That portion where he is talking, with the stage and the lecturing Ate Vi in the background--I was right at the back of the cameraman.

Vilma Santos' mother was also there. There sure were many film producers and directors present in the affair, it's just that I forgot their names or they were not acknowledged at all. Students and faculty members from different universities and colleges occupied most of the theater's seats. And yes, magpapahuli ba ang mga die-hard Vilmanians? They occupied the middle seats; you'll know its them with their distinctive gray hair.

PS. I don't have a camera to prove that what I say is true (but trust me, it really is true). Thankfully, in less than two months, I'm having my first digital camera! My aunt in Ohio is sending me one (bless her) after a month of grueling "courtship." So you might as well expect a photoblog from me in August.

* Title of audiovisual presentation directed by Jun Austria, quoted from scriptwriter Ricardo Lee's testimonial