Alternative Love (Mandarin)

I have realized that gay themed films from China, even though far and in between, are made with certain reservations and rush where stories are pretty ordinary and sometimes they are not brought to proper conclusion. The 70 isa minute film has a very ordinary story, something you have seen a zillion times, yet it leaves a lot to be desired.

School's popular boy You Xie is in a steady relationship with his girlfriend. When a new student Chang Jie joins the class, things change. Because of his interest in music, he and the girlfriend end up becoming friends. You Xie pays no attention to him, but one drunk night the two guys get into a one night stand and You Xie decides to do the right thing. He breaks up with his girlfriend and asks Chang Jie to be his boyfriend. The girl friend can't take this insult and will go to any lengths to bring back her love. But every single trick of hers gets exposed and it is increasingly hard for her to break apart the lovers. She then lets You Xie's sick mother know the truth, which leads to her being hospitalized and You Die hating his ex even more. The film ends here with hints of a possible sequel but I don't think it was ever made (Ot at least I am not aware of).

As I mentioned and you can probably see even by the story thatches film is pretty basic. I do see that the movie was probably trying to show how a college student boldly gets into a homosexual relationship in China, where homosexuality is looked down upon, but the movie skips too many important details, which makes the characters seem unreal. Also the editing was pretty bad. Scenes would be randomly thrown here and there and then you will see the sequence leading to the scene. It made no sense. And it kept repeating. Also, the love between the two leads was so random. Just because they had a drunk one night stand, are they really in love? There was no build up of why a supposedly straight guy You Xie fall for another guy without going through a process of events making him fall for him. You can't just overnight decide this. The characters definitely need more depth than the superficial persona we got to see. I can see why the girlfriend would try everything to get her boyfriend back but the kind of tricks she uses were so not cool and I would never be behind those.

I appreciate its efforts in making the movie about a homosexual couple, since China is, as far as I know, generally homophobic. However, the film is far from doing anything good for the LGBTQ+ people of the country. (4/10)

Comments

The Shortest Distance is Round 3: Fallen Flowers

Continuing with the weird trilogy of "The Shortest Distance", I am so glad that finally I am done with part 3 and won't have to deal with this again in future. Thankfully, as of now the makers have not announced any further parts; which will save all of us on this earth from the embarrassment of watching this in near future. After the first 10 minutes are used in sort of recapping bits of first two parts, the story moves forward. Haruto is now starting to have feelings for Ruka, the mysterious pole dancer from second part. In a fit of rage, Ruka ends up killing the goat man and to save him and Haruto, Shibahara asks them to go underground. Meanwhile Shibahara continues the search for Seiya (the guy who had cut off Haruto's penis). It turns out Seiya is now also taking care of the original club owner from part 1. Both of them were released after they had informed Shibahara of Aoyama's secret location. Shibahara tortures Seiya's boyfriend leading to Seiya killin...

Sei no Gekiyaku (Japanese) [Dangerous Drugs of Sex]

Every person has their own unique way of dealing with loss. This film is as much a psychological thriller as it is a soft porn BDSM portrayal of two young men that makes the film overall horrifying as well as humane. It is really hard to describe the genre of this film in one word. Its important not that the film has some really disturbing scenes so if you go into seeing this film, please proceed with caution. Although any sexual non-consensual activity is not ok, this film has its won strange way of showing that suicide is not the only solution to all life's problems. Makoto is a regular office goer, who just finds out that his girlfriend is probably cheating on him. ON top of it, his parents sudden death coming back from a trip that he forced them to take, he gets completely dejected and decides to commit suicide. Unknown to him, he is saved by mysterious man Yoda Ryoji, and he wakes up finding himself tied up in leather and belts in a very BDSM setting. This mysterious saver soo...

One Summer Night (Korean)

I really wanted to like this film but for non native speakers, these movie leaves a lot to be understood and the way scenes were unfolding in front of me, I wasn't sure many times what was really going on. The story had potential button getting any back story on any of the characters limited my ability to empathize with any of these actors. Film starts with two North Korea military guys Yong Joon and Jae Sung having sex and they are caught red handed and they run. Three years later we see Yong Joon in Seoul leading a very mundane and poor life. He has a boyfriend Tae-Kyu, who is a weird guy. He is carefree, doesn't do any work and is completely emotional and financially dependent on Young Joon. In fact, even Yong Joon will go to any lengths to protect him , fend for him and taking care of him to the extent of even taking up prostitution. Suddenly one day Jae Sung appears in their life again. His motivation is not clear but it is obvious he wants Yong Joon back in his life, who ...

Movie Reviews -
Gay Themed

Search This Blog