It is disturbing the way the Metro Manila Film Festival Executive Committee .jpg)
(MMFF ExeCom), headed by new Metro Manila Development Authority chair Emerson Carlos, gently handled the complaint on the disqualification of Honor Thy Father from the festival’s 2015 Best Picture category.
The MMFF is not without controversies — some were even worse.
At the Manila Film Festival (MFF), precursor of the MMFF, Ruffa Gutierrez and Gabby Concepcion were declared bogus Best Actress and Best Actor awardees, respectively, instead of the valid winners.
During the third MMFF, Lino Brocka threw invectives at board of jurors chair Rolando Tinio and walked out of the awarding ceremonies. This was to protest Celso Ad. Castillo’s Burlesk Queen, a Vilma Santos starrer, win of eight of the 10 medals (which were handed out that year) including the Best Picture award. Organizers asked the winners to return their medals as a result of the controversy.
At the 20th MMFF, board of jurors chair Alejandro Roces announced that “none of the entries was deserving” so six major awards including Best Picture were not given out.
NEW CONTROVERSY. In a controversial decision announced by the MMFF ExeCom on Dec. 26, 2015, a day before the awards night, the film starring John Lloyd Cruz and directed by Erik Matti was disqualified due to a technicality. The producers allegedly did not inform the ExeCom that their full-length feature would be screened as the opening film at the Cinema One Film Festival on Nov. 8.
Laguna Rep. Dan Fernandez, who has a supporting role in Honor Thy Father, filed a complaint with the House of Representatives to investigate the conflict of interest involving ExeCom member Dominic Du in relation to his company and the committee’s decision to ban the film.
Among the important persons who attended the first hearing were Matti, Fernandez, Carlos, ExeCom members Marichu Maceda, Eugino Villareal and Du, and three Board of Jurors members including Carmen Musngi. Cruz failed to attend as he had a personal appearance schedule in Japan.
Du admitted owning Axinite Digicinema Inc., a distributor of foreign films. Walang Forever won Best Picture, and Buy Now Die Later won Second Best Picture, both produced by Quantum Films’ Joji Alonso, who is Du’s legal counsel, according to Fernandez.
At the hearing, members of the board of jurors owned up in that it was Du and Maceda who told them not to consider Honor Thy Father as a contender for the Best Picture category as it had been disqualified.
Maceda explained the decision’s rationale: “We did not want the members of the jury to feel any bias against Honor Thy Father as far as the other categories were concerned. We felt very strongly that the sanction was only done on the producer and not to the other members of the movie.”
Honor Thy Father producers had claimed that they informed the MMFF about the Cinema One screening as early as Nov. 6. The last-minute decision to take the movie out of the Best Picture award, they reasoned out, was an unfair action.
Maceda explained the delay: “When we received the letter, it took us one month before the Special Committee and the Rules Committee met. At that time. we did not want to bother the newly appointed chairman, and there were so many other things scheduled.”
BUZZSTATION’S OPINION. If producers of the official entries signed to a “judges’ decisions are final” clause, they are without legal recourse. This may be the reason the Execom is taking the issue lightly.
This is a regular provision in most competition rules and regulations, which is a requirement in the acceptance of participation to the annual nationwide festival of Filipino films. They have no valid ground to complain. It is safe to assume the Honor Thy Father producers signed.
Such a provision is standard to avoid complaints, whether due or undue, to ensure an orderly conduct of the competition. Filipinos are such bad losers with a propensity not to accept defeat and complain cheating as a reason. Just check election protests as proof.
The only time such a complaint can prosper is when the result of the competition does not reflect the judges’ decision. In Honor Thy Father’s case, such a violation is not present.
About the conflict of interest issue, this is not the only time such alleged infraction happened. In fact, it is allowed by MMFF rules as the members of the ExeCom are “vested” interests as they have business interests related to film production and/or distribution.
Walang Forever was distributed by Quantum Films owned by Alonso as listed in the full-length feature’s Wikipedia. Alonso is managing director of the law firm Alonso and Associates, Inc. that is the legal counsel of the Motion Picture Anti-Film Piracy Council of which Du is president.
Axinite Digicinema is a national foreign film distribution company linked with OctoArts Films, a film production and distribution company owned by Orly R. Ilacad whose legal counsel is also Alonso. Possibly, Alonso is also an investor in Axinite Digicinema. Theoretically, such business relationship removes the reported conflict of interest.
What the complainants conveniently forgot is that Du is only a member of the ExeCom and does not hold veto power over its decisions. He holds just a vote. If he was allowed to participate in competition deliberations, that was with the acceptance of other members.
His decision/s only reflected his own, one voice among several voices. The ExeCom also has a head and failure to act in an unfair action or decision is collusion.
Alonso is like all business persons who must maximize profitability for herself and her shareholders. All producers took actions to accomplish this in the same way the producers of Honor Thy Father took actions to maximize their own business interests.
Her professional link with Du is really immaterial in this issue. She has not committed as any act against MMFF rule so the complainant must stop linking her to their grievances as they are making themselves legally vulnerable.
BOTTOMLINE. Complainants must honor the judges as the disqualification issue will boil down to accepting their decisions without recourse.