Skip to main content

Stupid Boys Stupid Love (Vietnamese Series)

By Golu
Before I start writing the review if this series, I have to say that the show had the most androgynous looking actors I have ever seen. I still cannot fathom if some of the characters were male/female or gender neutral. Its just an observation from me and I am not sure if that was intentional or not. Another noticeable thing fo rme was the kids school uniform. I have never seen such a school uniform and it was such a welcome and refreshing change from the white short and grey shorts of the Thai BL dramas (just kidding). This is a sweet and fun and silly mini series of 4 episodes of 20 minutes each, which is a very easy breezy watch about a coming-of-age story,

This is a story about 5 friends and starts with Nghia drama about trying to kiss his best friend Minh. At that moment, he realizes that Minh is now just not a friend, but the individual to whom he is deeply attracted to in a sexual way. This of course can be very confusing. Nghia tries to convince Minh that he is more to him than just a friend, but Minh pretends to just dismiss his overtures. Until one day Minh finally confesses that Nghia should stop playing with his emotions since he is gay and it will be easy for him to fall for him and eventually the duo get together. The other story of a boy(?) Tien completely smitten by a girl named Tu, who is a budding fashion designer. Tu is aware of Tien's feelings for her, but she still manipulates (in a flirty way) her influence to try and get her to admit her feelings, so she could then admit hers. And finally we have the fifth person, a shy and timid and loner student, who is bullied in school by his step brother. One day the coffee shop owner where he works stands up for him and the teenage boy immediately falls in love with her. At the end of this series, we see these two talking and perhaps trying to develop into something more.

My favorite thing about the show was Nghia trying to get Minh's attention and make him fall for him. He is clumsy, silly yet very relatable. It is an adorable romp with added adolescent clumsiness and the series captures the teenage behaviors quite accurately. All along, the assumption was that Minh was either disinterested in Nghia or ‘straight’. In reality, he is GAY and is falling, hard, for Nghia and this constant teasing is making him fall in love with him even more. Obviously, he does not want to be hurt if Nghia is just teasing him or just playing with his emotions. This came as a complete shock to me, and I found it to be so unexpectedly adorable. The other two stories are also given decent prominence, but personally, of course, I was interested in the gay love story. It is a story of five friends who are in high school and are finding, and to some degree, exploring their feelings for others on a more intense level. It affectionately seems like ‘puppy-love’, but it is presented in a surprisingly progressive fashion. The show may not be everyone's cup of tea honestly and many may find it stupid. But somehow the teenage and adolescent silliness felt real and the makers tried to capture their sentiments being endearing, charming, seeing the world through beautifully myopic eyes, yet profoundly cruel.

Overall, I thought the show was quite decent watch. It doesn't require a lot of investment time wise and took me to my teenage years when you may have a crush on someone and how our attractions to others felt so good, exciting, and all ours and sometimes quite sudden and almost always unrequited. And the series captures that well. (6/10)
Labels:

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

The Shortest Distance is Round 3: Fallen Flowers

By Golu
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
5 comments
Read more

One Summer Night (Korean)

By Golu
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
Post a Comment
Read more

Ultimate masturbation: Shigoki no yama (Japanese) [The Ultimate Masturbation]

By Golu
I would never know what was the point behind making this film. Was it supposed to be a comedy, cos it wasn't. It wasn't even porn. It was just a silly attempt at making something absolutely senseless and ridiculous. The story, as well as direction is equally shoddy. You could laugh for having seen something so bad, but I wouldn't call that comedy. An old man runs a camp about gay masturbation. The explanation given is that gays masturbate for pleasure unlike straight men, for whom the act is seen as shame or because they can't find a woman. One day a straight man shows up and wants to join the camp for his thesis. After discussion, he is allowed in. Rules include that you can masturbate together, you can masturbate one another, but there is no fellatio or anal sex. Some students of course breaks rule. The teacher then talks about 2 forms of masturbation which gives ultimate pleasure. He shows one without touching and then refuses to talk of the other. Somehow suddenly,
Post a Comment
Read more