Lan se da men

Dreamy, Romantic, Tender. OK We've been given those on the poster. They are not ones I would use. Instead I'd go with: Adorable, Sweet, Sensitive, Well-acted, Well-directed, Well-written. It was a JOY to watch this film.

It took me a few minutes to warm up to the characters, but only a few. We meet the two girls first, a girly-girl who seems to be in control, and a brooding follower. Not much to go on with that. Girly girl spots sensitive boy and wants him, but insists that brooding girl act as the go-between.

The film focuses on the friendship that develops between brooding girl and sensitive boy after that. Brooding girl becomes razor-sharp, adorably mixed up commando teen when paired up with sensitive boy who has fallen in love with her.

This film did a remarkable job of capturing teens as they are: insecure and passionate; as easily hurt as they are to fall in love. They provoke each other without knowing why. One of the many highlights of this film is when the boy and girl, when they've run out of verbal ammunition, begin a shoving match. It goes on for some time and then the director simply cuts to a scene of the two of them straightening up their surroundings together. The director makes many decisions like that to keep us focused on the big picture: (stuff) happens, and then something else happens. There's no stopping it.

I have to point out that watching this Taiwanese film with English subtitles added quite a bit to the adorableness of it. For example, after brooding girl sets up sensitive boy with girly-girl, who knows he likes brooding girl, (you have to see the film to see how that happens), sensitive boy walks girly-girl home. After an uncomfortably done good-bye, girly-girl calls out after sensitive boy as he's about to mount his bicycle and says: "Zhang Shihao, (pause) can you date with me?" I don't know exactly what was said in Taiwanese, but that odd translation seemed to capture the moment perfectly.

I smiled from ear to ear while watching this movie from the time sensitive boy was introduced until the very end. This is an exceptionally well done film.

I went to see this by chance one wet afternoon after work and came out feeling great. It's a quirky little gem that carries you along and reminds you of the innocence and emotions you felt as a teenager. It does this in a manner that is totally authentic to the culture from which it comes and reminds us of our own cultures loss of identity.

The male character is interesting as he is initially manipulated as a naive male teen by the lead female (who is lesbian), but later metamorphosis's into a strong and true friend who we could all use. I loved the bit where they sit on their bicycles next to each other in the traffic and watch each others faces in between inching alternatively ahead of each other.

Do you remember what you have done when you are 17? If it is similar to how i remembered mine, then this movie would invoke alot of memories. Isn't life like that: simple, un-eventful, yet confusing and full of uncertainties?

I applaud the way the director handled this coming-of-age movie. He managed to touch a really heavy topic like homosexuality without throwing it into our face. He had managed to keep everything simple, with no dramatic ups and downs, but accurately reflect the lives of 17 year olds. The lead characters may seem too sweet and innocent, but pretty accurate to people in Asia.

To keep the movie real, the director went to the streets and got the male lead Chen Bo-lin (Zhang Shi Hao) and the female lead Gui Lun Mei (Meng Ke Rou) and all of the other cast. And knowing that they were all first time actors really lifts up the mood of the movie. I say they did a great job. By the way, the name 'Meng Ke Rou' means 'fierce subdue the gentle' (although not the exact words, the pronunciation is similar), which to me is a subtle undertext to her character. The biggest applause goes to Gui who did a great job portraying in Meng's confusion and awkwardness, and her struggle to conform to society's standards.

Watch the movie for its simplicity, if you are looking for a plot heavy, technically driven movie, this is the wrong place. One of my fave movies of all times.

Upon seeing it at the AFI Fest, Yee Chin-yen's "Blue Gate Crossing" instantly became one of my favorite pictures of 2003.

The premise is very simple, and yet it is one of those about which the less is said, the better. Simply put, it examines the effect on two girls, best friends in high school, when one has a crush from afar on a boy, and the other actually starts talking to him. The writing is delicate, the performances completely natural and real. Even the look of the movie -- echoing Wong Kar-Wai's elegantly composed, florescent-lit romances -- is stylish without being over-stylized. The narrative is never forced, and yet the ground covered encompasses the awkwardness of a first kiss, the vagaries of sexual orientation, the safety of fantasy over reality, and the nature of friendship -- both the kinds that just happen and those that come about because they've been earned. Finally, the last minute of this movie made a mess of me, I haven't gushed so hard since "Whale Rider."

First of all, if something has to be written about this film, it's about the poetic way the director talks about teenage problem in Asia. The story, about a young man and two young girls is really close to the "2 girls and a boy" type and at the beginning, you can be afraid that the film would be like a boredom teenage movie, but be confident, it's not and so go on watching it... The love story is about teenagers who don't love the right person (the girl who loves her classmate who is also a girl, who loves a young man, who loves the first girl) and the thing which makes it interesting is the fact that the story is not focused on the three people but only on two of them who try to create a false couple (as their love is not mutual and shared). This couple transforms itself in a kind of friendship, born from incomprehension.

How sometimes destiny makes us meet some people by chance, those who will be essential to our lives. That's the real topic of this movie. Little by little, the girl, who's afraid to love girls and the guy, who's afraid to be alone start to know each other and to love each other, even if they'll never be a couple. The movie is good because of that way to treat teenage relationships and also by the quality of the image.

The work on image is really really good. Some sequences are quite splendid (like the first sequence or the one with the two main characters on bicycles) and the music is also really good (a simple piano theme). The actors are really incredible and fit absolutely their characters.

The whole charm of the movie lies in the real fragility of teenage relationships and on how life is taken by these characters : complicated, light and sometimes quite incredibly beautiful.