Nora is 2014 UP Gawad Plaridel awardee and hands-down Cinemalaya X Best Actress winner

It is certainly no secret that from the day she was born, Nora Aunor was meant to rule the world. Even as we look back to her beginnings in Iriga, Camarines Sur where she is said to have sold water to the customers on the bus bound for the big city, she knew that she would soon be on that very same bus to pursue her dream.

Nora loved to sing, in fact she had joined competitions, winning many times in her hometown. That seemed to be the dream she had in mind when she finally boarded that bus for Manila. Flash forward many years since then. Nora’s name as a singer had already brought her fame and with it the attendant fortune as well as depravity that comes with it, but which her millions of screaming fans chose to ignore. She married a dream catch in Christopher de Leon who sought to discipline her and failed, until eventually they separated.

]Meanwhile, despite her undisciplined behavior, Nora was discovered for the movies, then TV giving the medium her own inimitable brand, with her fans still standing behind her. Lino Brocka directed her in Bona that competed abroad. Ishmael Bernal gave her the unforgettable Himala that to this day is a byword among believers. However, this wasn’t enough, until gradually, slowly, everything was quiet. “Napagod na kami,” a rabid fan confesses. Years have passed, everyone had aged and Nora was still living her dream.

The crash came while in the US where she got into a drug issue. It gave Nora the wake up call. She must have decided on her own to call on all the gods in the heavens to come to her aid, and miraculously, they listened. She started receiving offers not just from her old clients but new ones as well. Many of them were big names in the film industry, the biggest being Brillante Mendoza who stunned the world by winning the Best Director trophy at the Cannes Film Festival of 2009 with Kinatay, defeating such big names as Pedro Almodovar, Quentin Tarantino and Ang Lee. Brillante decided to risk it with Nora in Thy Womb and he has not been sorry. She gave the performance of her life, as if her entire future depended on it.

Since then, Nora has behaved astonishingly. She was recently considered as finalist for the National Artist of the Philippines award, called the Philippine version of the Oscars. Expectations were high since Nora topped the list. Sadly, despite being No. 1, she didn’t make it.

In the recently concluded Cinemalaya X, Nora was in the running for Best Actress in Hustisya directed by Joel Lamangan. This time, she happily received her trophy smiling broadly as if to say that she deserved that  honor of being crowned queen.

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