This review may contain spoilers
wanted to watch this ages ago cause of Ray Chang, since seeing him in We Best Love: No. 1 For You & warming up to him in We Best Love: Fighting Mr. 2nd, Meow Meow Boss & I Am Sorry, I Love You - wanted to check out more of his work & found this. but had a gut feeling that this would be sad, so put this off for yrs... & this had a very gloomy atmosphere from the get go IMO, even as kids there was this somber undertone to everything. by the end everyone was crying & i am sitting here wondering WTF. from the one sentence description, i assumed Shane & Jonathan already were attracted to each other, but cause of "society" didn't act on it... Carrie showing up, falling for Shane allowed Shane to distance himself from the person he loved or some such... not the case - 1st off Carrie moved to their town cause she "met" Jonathan via the school news paper & i guess they fell in-love. but when they were together & tried to consummate their love, Jonathan realized he wasn't attracted to women. maybe he always knew he was attracted to boy's/men & specifically to Shane & (ironically) Carrie was his attempt at forcing himself into being "normal", but that attempt made him face reality.
what i don't get is why Carrie, who understood that Jonathan didn't just reject her cause he was gay, but that he was in-love with Shane - her then turning to Shane, cause she was hurting. was that a subconscious way of hurting Jonathan for rejecting her?!? bitchy move - sorry not sorry.
also ironically i usually hate the trope; where one friend falls in-love with his bff & then cause the bff doesn't feel the same & never will, said friend decides on his own, not only enough is enough, but it's time to cut ties without consulting or giving their bff a heads-up. but this time around, i got Jonathans pain & he did try to tough it out... but given how he was physically losing it, i get his need to end things.
what i don't get (again) why the frack Shane f*ck Jonathan?!??? did he always know that Jonathan saw him as more then a friend, but as he didn't feel the same he ignored it/played dumb. but now that he was gonna lose Jonathan, he slept with him to keep him by his side?!? if so, another douche move cause 1. he is in a relationship with Carrie & 2. what he gonna offer Jonathan? the mistress role?!? or his taking them to the beach, was him trying to find the words to suggest an open relationship, a throuple??
either way i aint as impressed as others watching, cause this was very confusing half way towards the end, all 3 crying instead of talking, didn't help & then it just cut off - like is that supposed to help me understand this plot any better?!? idk i guess i needed clarity & more dialogue between Shane & Jonathan - this wasn't satisfying or enjoyable to me.
Was this review helpful to you?
This review may contain spoilers
Why, google?
I google searched "best queer romance movies to watch". This is one that google suggested. I've used this website for reading reviews of queer dramas and movies in the past to get a picture of the drama and they were usually negative about the drama but I watched the drama and wound up really liking the drama! But the reviews here in my opinion poorly reflect how the movie actually was. Start the movie out by showing the 3 leads in what comes to be what they would have looked like after the final scene. Also the monologue which Jonathan is saying at the beginning makes no sense imo. The actors did a really great job. But the random jumps between scenes (especially the jump between high school and university) make no sense. I thought Jonathan had to retake the exams but he's in university? When did Shane and Carrie decide to hook up? And hello the book at the beginning about the theory of transgenderism? That makes no sense and isn't relevant what-so-ever as being transgender has nothing to do with the story nor plot. And then Jonathan is always mad at Shane but Shane still considers him a best friend? Why did Jonathan hook up with that one man? It made no sense. Why did Shane and Jonathan have sex then explain nothing? Why did Shane take the 3 of them to the beach? Jonathan says he really loves Shane but Shane says Jonathan has always been his best friend? Is Jonathan rejected? Does Shane break up with Carrie? I'm sorry but wtf. The soundtrack was beautiful and I guess it's supposed to make you emotional, and the cinematography is wonderful. Honestly, I never have high expectations for a movie and my standards are really low. But as a queer individual, I genuinely do not think any of the screenwriters were queer, seeing how the one queer character doesn't even do anything to indicate being queer aside from stopping having sex with Carrie, indicating he likes Shane, and sleeping with a man--how does it make sense? The soundtrack was beautiful but just because the soundtrack was beautiful and cinematography was nice doesn't mean it's a good movie that makes any sense.Was this review helpful to you?
"You know Jonathan, if you add your marks with mine, we make a perfect 100!" said Shane
What a lovely movie!I started watching this very randomly because I was bored and outside it was gloomy dark weather, somehow I ended up watching this movie. It's hard to explain in words how beautiful the whole story, cast, the acting and the cinematography was. It's an unspoken feeling that will linger on your mind for couple of days.
Teenage love is hard, beautiful and full of inexperienced unknown emotions which wa portrayed that pragmatically as possible. Love and friendship intertwined and presented longing, belonging and finally founding peace with one's own mind, which is the most exhausting journey in the world. Shane is longing for a lifelong friendship from Jonathan and he is bottling up his love for Shane.
What I loved about this movie is that they will not show you your pre-assumed happy ending but something more than that. The background music is very soothing, it just blends into the theme so well that it creates a nostalgic earthy aura around it.
Highly recommendable and it's better to watch it alone, so that you can feel the characters like I did.
But one spoiler, don't expect "happy ending". It's not your normal fluffy BL but a LGBTQ themed queer awakening movie.
Was this review helpful to you?
A Pretentious 'Masterpiece'
Not all films or series with a good cinematography and acting are worth it, especially when the story is trash... This is how I'll describe this film.This is very pretentious, to the point that there is no meat to the story in itself.
The actors and music were decent. Too bad that in its goal to be artsy, the rest of the aspects of a good creation was forgotten. To think that the length of the film was sufficient.
Even a problematic person would have a more decisive way of storytelling and reasoning than what the writers did to this film.
I deel bad that it looks promising but it remained to be all in the surface as nothing is inside it.
I ended watching the film with regret... regret that I even bothered to watch it.
Was this review helpful to you?
A masterpiece!
Why did nobody "warn" me this was a masterpiece?No BL clichés but a very sensitive portrayal of the characters' inner conflicts.
Nobody is a villain even though they often hurt each other.
You suffer with the characters but you enjoy the suffering because you experienced something similar before.
Who has not experienced a situation when you don't understand yourself, feel lost, hate your feelings and even get angry with people who arouse those feelings in you?
I have never given a 10/10 rating before (and I've seen a lot - check my watchlist) but here it is a must.
Was this review helpful to you?
This review may contain spoilers
I really liked the movie, i also rewatched it and noticed that the beginning is actually part of the ending. I would have liked more closesure about the ending how they end up. I do think shane loved jonathan more then a friend but was just in denial, he also liked cassie but i think more the idea of being toghether with her. I think jonathan always knew that shane would never have a relationship with him that's why he said in the beginning something along the lines of " i was to afraid to stand by you" he was still afraid so he never told his feelings, in the end he did bc he knew that their friendship was already kinda ruined.this is my opinion !!! sorry english isn't my first language !
Was this review helpful to you?
Good themes but confusing
This film has several extremely emotional scenes between the leads that absolutely blew me away, but as a whole, it feels very janky and choppy.There's not a lot of development between the characters in between the big moments, and the timeline just feels really unclear, as if we're jumping from scene to scene instead of experiencing the passing of time. I found myself pretty confused about what had happened between the characters and how long it took.
The acting is pretty good, but I think the script needed more tightening.
Was this review helpful to you?
This review may contain spoilers
pointless movie
I try to make this short. when you watch a movie or anything at all you ask yourself - ok so what was the point in this plot? what they try to achieve by making this movie this way? what emotions they want from us?This is the biggest problem with this movie - I didn't felt like it try to do anything! it have no directions at all! events can happen and another event and another and you just feel nothing cause there isn't any emotions behind those scenes and events or any connection like A connect to B, B to C atc. here you have no connection to anything.
there is some people that will love this movie and that's fine. me on the other hand belong to the group that didn't like it at all. Especially the end of the movie, that can't even be called an ending. they just stand there and look at each other for no reason and you feel how pointless it all was.
the most annoying thing in all the characters in this movie - they can't use words or speak to each other so they have sex. that how it felt like. will it kill them to sit together and really talk about what they feel/want in an open discussion? and I don't only mean the two main guys, of course they can't talk openly cause they need a conflict, but at least they can be open with the girl and the girl can be open about her damn feelings for real with those two guys!!! it felt so force and annoying how they all act, yeas all the main characters are just running away all the damn movie and will never talk about things! even in the end it was so irritating I wanted to punch all of them in the face. I didn't even mind if the two guys didn't end up together but at least try to make this believable, even for a little bit.
I really try to like one of the main characters, but all of them just annoyed me.
and the camera angles, god the camera angles drive me crazy! can't they hold a fucking camera steadily without me getting dizzy?! it was suck. I'm sorry but it really was bad.
the music wasn't too bad though. so I give them that.
Was this review helpful to you?
This review may contain spoilers
Unlikable characters and unsatisfying ending
I hated a lot of things about this.Carrie? Awful. She didn't care about anyone but herself and she was a truly terrible friend to Jonathan.
Shane? Awful, but he was just doing his best. At least I thought so until the weird sex scene that came out of nowhere. Why did he do that? Did he have feelings for Jonathan or was he doing that to keep him from leaving?
Jonathan? He deserved better than what both the other characters put him through emotionally.
The ending? Awful. Where is the closure? It ended without actually knowing where Shane stands or knowing his motives for certain things he did. Is he picking Carrie? Is he picking Jonathan? Does he get to keep them both? Does he lose one? We just don't know and that made the entire experience of the movie a waste of time because nothing actually mattered and nothing is resolved.
Was this review helpful to you?
WHAT WAS EVEN THE POINT?
First of all this movie made no sense, especially the ending which was the worst ending i have ever seen. I've heard of this movie before and I thought that I should give it a try as I was also really bored and just decided to watch this,It started off okayish but then it started going down hill and the story just became a whole mess. The girl annoyed me so much like every time she appeared on the screen I already knew she was going to do something stupid like when she kissed Jonathan and then not long after got with his best friend Shane.
Also Jonathon and Shane's friend ship was so confusing and stupid like how are you letting on random girl that came into your lives ruin your friendship as she caused so many issues.
IDK WHAT ELSE TO SAY BUT I ACTUALLY AM SO DISAPPOINTED IN THIS MOVIE AND IM SURPRISED I EVEN GAVE IT MORE THAN 2 STARS.
Was this review helpful to you?
Waste of time
[NOT a BL]I might be harsh in saying this but this film was a waste of time watching. And I had most of it on 1.25x speed.
Overall, this film was very realisitc in how it was written, filmed and presented. There were no cliches and the plot of the film could happen in real life.
I just found that it was so boring as a viewer. There was no plot, there was no storyline and the film was poorly made.
The storyline follows the 3 characters' journey from high school to college. And with the title being 'Eternal Summer' you would expect it to take place in between the two. But it doesnt. It mainly focuses on high school exams and suddenly, there is a huge time jump, completely skipping the summer and you dont even realise they're in college until the end.
The romance is confusing, as it is in real life, however it wasnt portrayed great here. I find the issue with realistic films is that the viewer experience is lacking. I was bored. The characrers hide things from each other and it causes tension, but its never explored or established or even resolved, so the viewer is left feeling confused and annoyed.
In terms of acting, it was mediocre. There was no emotion apart from the intense scenes, which make me think that the cast are inexperienced. Becuase their facial expressions were boring. I had no idea what the characters were thinking half the time.
This film had so much potential but it was wasted.
Was this review helpful to you?
Was this review helpful to you?
