Piolo Pascual

The mother of Piolo Pascual, one of the most bankable stars in the country, is making a television appearance for the first time.

Acceding to the request of his mother, Pascual and mother Amelia will play on ABS-CBN’s top-rating game show “Kapamilya Deal or No Deal” on Friday.

Will they be lucky and become the first contestants to win the P4-million jackpot?

On Monday, meanwhile, two equally gorgeous actors - Jake Cuenca and Gerald Anderson – will try to outsmart the “banker” in order to win the coveted cash prize.

Cuenca and Anderson are the lead stars of the newest television series “Tayong Dalawa.”

The show, which is hosted by Kris Aquino, airs weeknights after  “Mischievous Princess.”

abs-cbnNEWS.com | 01/29/2009 12:38 PM

Here’s a drinking game you can do while watching “Love Me Again (Land Down Under)” starring Piolo Pascual and Angel Locsin. Get a drink everytime a character has his back turned while another person is talking to them earnestly. Every major character, including a couple of minor ones, does it in this movie, which is a very cinematic technique but quite overdone.

“Love Me Again”, produced by ABS-CBN’s Star Cinema, does a couple of firsts — it’s the first movie to screen outside the country before its regular theatre run in the Philippines. It is also the first to test the box office mettle of the Piolo-Angel tandem less than a year after their hit “Lobo” television series.

Right off the bat, Angel and Piolo show viewers why their teamup has the potential to become box-office dynamite. Angel and Piolo are pretty good actors who exhibit a luminous quality on screen. The only problem is the movie’s plot pulls few surprises and wastes the thespic talents of the leads.

In a nutshell, Love Me Again tells the story of Migo (Piolo) and Ara (Angel), two Bukidnon natives whose love for each other is severely tested through life’s storms. After drifting through life as the gallivanting prodigal, Migo is finally ready to settle down to a rancher’s life in Bukidnon, and hopefully, married life with Ara. Ara, however, has dreams of pursuing a better life abroad. A family accident forces Ara’s hand and the two are separated in the timely tradition of all romance films. Ara also accepts the marriage proposal of her Australian employer but Migo arrives in the Australian Outback to further complicate her plans. Does anyone even doubt where this is going? And does it really matter?

Few pluses

Memo to Rory Quintos: stop making your actors move so much. Enough with the stock poses and overt musical cues.  At one point, Color It Red’s “Paglisan” plays over a scene to show how Piolo adjusts to life without Angel and vice-versa. There are scenes of cows dying and Angel lifting hay with her bare hands. That said, more happens in that four-minute sequence than in the first 15 minutes of the film when the two leads just waste time doing a lot of dewy-eyed back and forth.

The movie delivers a few pluses. Bukidnon is beautifully shot and feels like a travelogue that could entice tourists. On the other hand, there’s a sparseness to the Australia scenes that leave one feeling cold and longing for home. Kudos also go to using more natural sound in the movie than the usual spruced up overdubs done by local moviemakers. Ricky Davao adds some much needed gravitas and utters the one line that sums up the movie perfectly, that some things must change no matter how much we want it to stay the same.

But this movie’s success rests solely on its leads. Angel and Piolo keep your eyes glued even when hampered with hackneyed dialogue. They’re believable cowboys, too. For the much ballyhooed love scene, Angel exposes her bare back in a very dimly-lit barn that doesn’t quite heat things up. Here’s a tip to Luis Manzano: the horseback riding scenes generate more genuine excitement than the love scene. Also, the scene of Angel hugging her computer monitor (you’ll know it when you see it) is deeply affecting and plumbs some genuine emotion.

Is this movie going to win more fans for Angel and Piolo? Possible. Does it suffer from “seen it a million times” syndrome? Heck, yes. Will it please diehard Piolo-Angel fans? From the shrieks of the people who kept reacting to every scene with Angel and Piolo, the answer is a resounding Yes.

By DAVID DIZON/ abs-cbnNEWS.com | 01/21/2009 7:24 PM

Hindi lamang ang kanyang mga kakontemporaryo ang humahanga sa kaguwapuhan at kakisigan ni Piolo Pascual kundi ang mga beterana ring aktres tulad nina Gina Alajar at Lorna Tolentino.

Ito ang inamin ni Alajar kamakailan nang mapag-usapan muli ang kanyang partisipasyon sa paglulunsad ni Ricardo Lee ng nobelang “Para Kay B.”

Bumasa si Gina ng mga bahagi sa nobela at kanyang binigyang-buhay kasama sina Piolo at Lorna.

“Noon namang una, hindi ko pinapansin si Piolo. Para sa akin, isa lang siya sa marami, you know what I mean. Nakikita ko siya sa TV pero hanggang do’n lang,” sabi ni Alajar.

Pero nang magkrus anya ang kanilang landas sa UP Bahay ng Alumni sa Diliman kamakailan, napuna ng aktres na kaiba pala talaga ang panghalina ni Pascual sa madla.

“Iba ang appeal niya sa personal. No’ng una, a, sige, alam kong kasama ko siya sa interpretative reading pero later, parang gusto ko nang magpapirma sa kanya ng autograph,” pagtatapat ni Gina.

Kaya hindi na niya pinatagal pa at matapos ang kanilang pagtatanghal, walang inisip si Alajar kundi ang magpakuha ng larawan kasama si Piolo.

“Ang lakas ng dating niya. At mabait in person. Kaya naman pala siya sikat,” wika ni Alajar.

Naikuwento rin ni Gina ang paghanga ni Lorna sa batang aktor.

“Si LT rin, noong una, wala naman daw dating sa kanya si Piolo. As usual, one of those din pero alam naman natin na may hitsura si Piolo at magaling umarte pero iba sa personal, sabi ni LT.

“Kaya tawa ako nang tawa kasi, nang magpa-picture ako kay Piolo, siyempre, sumunod rin si LT sa pagpapa-picture,” natatawang kuwento ni Gina.

Kaya lang, dagdag ni Alajar, hindi pa lubusang naipapahayag ni Tolentino ang kanyang paghanga kay Piolo dahil kamamatay lang ng asawa ng aktres na si Rudy Fernandez.

“Pero nagpapasalamat naman si LT dahil sa contribution ni Piolo sa kanilang record na ‘Hope.’ Wala pa kasing isang taon na namamatay si Rudy kaya behaved na behaved si LT,” sabi ni Alajar.

as of 01/07/2009 12:29 PM