Eternal Summer

Eternal Summer-S0E0

one of the best films I've seen, story of friendship, love, confusion and sacrifice. every character in this movie showed every emotion a human being can give....jonathan will give you love, confusion, sacrifice...shane will give you love and acceptance....carrie will give you acceptance and sacrifice...,,,it made me cry....it is as beautiful as brokeback mountain...the actors were very good...they acted as if they're no cameras...the musical score is superb, right music for the right emotions...the way the director did the love scene near the end was outstanding, it showed passion without being obscene, the dialogues in the ending was perfect...this is one movie you should have a copy....it will teach you the true meaning of acceptance, love and sacrifice

Eternal summer is a sweet and bitter love triangle between guys and one girl. Johnathan, the shy and reserved, fell for his best friend, Shane, the outgoing and sporty. Carrie who initially fell for Johnathan then became in love with Shane. Not sure if Carrie was really in love with Shane or just used Shane to get close to Johnathan. It is very hard to believe that Shane had spent one intimate night with Johnathan and still see him as his best friend. I think Shane also has some feelings for Johnathan more than friendship. It seems to me that these two developed feelings for each other over the long period of their friendship. Shane is prob. bisexual but he probably doesn't realize it. The film has a lot of implications that Shane seems confused, lost, and even edgy without Johnathan around more so than without Carrie. There is no explicit ending for these 3 at the end. I can understand how Johnathan felt when he found out his "best friend" had a girlfriend, the hurt and rejection he felt yet he couldn't tell the others. I can understand how Shane felt when he could only watch Shane fall asleep and control his reactions all because this is not acceptable by the society and not knowing how Shane felt about him. At the end, Shane said that he is really lonely and sees Johnathan as his truly best friend. I really have doubts about what he said. I really believe that Shane sees Johnathan more than a best friend but he is prob. in denial and confused, too.. Only if Johnathan can ask Shane if Shane loves him, too... The music is great, very touching. Both Johnathan and Shane gave strong performances. Carrie is good, too but didn't shine as the other two. I wish the movie has a really ending..

A brave effort Director Leste Chen has ventured into an unlikely genre with a brave heart, but the results are another matter. It is a film that attempts to be compelling, emotional and consequential, but ultimately it fails to connect with the audience. The film itself is like a beautiful image, filled with daring performances, outstanding direction and lighting, but somehow it falls short and perhaps ending up being quite lacking. Putting together two relatively unknown male leads enhance the credibility of the film by being more believable and surprisingly they handed their respective roles with suitable bravery and emotionally performed. Coming from the lush of fame from the arty 20:30:40, Kate Yeung is suitably nature and a potential filled performance worthy of noting. The movie goes like this: The film opens with elementary school kid Jonathan (Bryant Chang), ordered by the teacher to befriend his classmate Shane (Joseph Chang). Since then, they have shared every episode in their lives until Carrie (Kate Yeung) becomes their high school classmate... It is still a mystery, as to the prime reason why the movie never seem to connect to Neo, perhaps it is the subject matter it is dealing with, but the film is ultimately distant and leaving far too many stones unturned in the process. Some twists like the controversial sex scene is far more shocking and brave than actually affecting and connecting. It is probably safe to say that the script is really a let down, as everything else seems like the product of good cinema. There is no doubt that the filmmaker here is daring and is not afraid to expose edgy issues and there are even scenes that reminds us of a far superior –Wong Kar Wai's film – Happy Together. Unfortunately this flick never reaches those heights and the effect is more like experimental cinema than actual accomplished cinema. Still, with all the criticisms the performances of the trio is without doubt the core saviour for the film as they are able to create believable characters and act beyond the material they are given. Byrant Chang handles his role in an outright sympathetic manner with his heart torn between his love for his best friend and his duty to maintain his friendship. He is expressive and subtle at times, creating a performance that is worthy of some recognition. Likewise, Joseph Chang performs extremely well in a complex role, but in a way his performance may well be enhanced by the sudden shocks within the scripts, rather than his actual performance. Nonetheless, he remains a fine young talent. Of the trio, Kate Yeung is given the filling parts or perhaps what Neo calls "a paper thin role", but somehow, Yeung is able to act beyond her material and resulting in the most natural performance of the trio. She is a bright young talent and despite not being an outright beauty, her talents by far outweigh that minor physical flaw. All in all, Eternal Summer is by no means a bad movie, and in fact it almost has all the ingredients to set it up as an outright award winning arty film. Unfortunately the film failed to connect and affect to the audience's emotions, resulting in a finale that is more emotional and tense for the people on screen, rather than the ones looking on. It is ultimately a trying and brave effort and for that alone, it is worthy of giving some sort of credit to. Nonetheless, it is an interesting look into the lives of three tormented souls and the daring performances are alone worthy of a pat on the shoulders for their efforts… (Neo 2006) I rate it 7.5/10. www.thehkneo.com

This film is about the friendship and relationship of 2 schoolboys and a schoolgirl in rural Taiwan. This film is slow, but it is beautifully made. The characters are developed very well. The plot is touching and intense. The psychological turmoil of Jonathan is portrayed well through his expressions and his behaviour. The film successfully portrays teenage identity confusion, jealousy, passion and love. It is a beautiful portrayal of same sex feelings. Only one comment though, I think the director uses too much mirrors. I can think of at least five scenes that uses a mirror (and nothing else can be seen apart from the mirror) to reflect what is going on in the other side of the room. The technique can add depth and can offer great composition of the shot, but I think it really is overused in the movie.

Firstly I thought: oh boy, just another movie I know I'm going to think later, why I wasted my time watching it. Not being from Taiwan and not speaking mandarin, the movie actually was a big surprise. With actors I'm not familiar with but the type of people we could say, "the neighbor next door", which also gave the movie a more sense of reality, a sense of something that could really have happened with the neighbor next door. Or maybe, even with any of us. It's just a movie about teenagers growing up and learning about love and getting trapped in conflicting feelings. The beauty of this movie is they didn't need huge cinematographic production. No need of cursing, no need of explicit sex scenes, no need of over-doings to tell the story of a strong friendship being trembled. With also, a really nice soundtrack. I definitely enjoyed have watched it! Drop the idea of big productions, drop the language barrier and enjoy it...

I agree with the other review that this film is very moving. It is not a perfect film but I enjoyed it very much. The music is rather syrupy which lends to the film's tear jerking nature. But the story is very well done and the performances of the leads are very strong and they do have very good chemistry. I'm not sure that the sex scene really made a whole lot of sense to me and there seemed to be a fair amount edited out of the story which might have made the film better and fleshed things out a bit more. I think the characters are rather relatable for most gay guys. I certainly had my share of straight friends who I was in love with over the years. And I liked the way the story is told from the beginning of their friendship. I wasn't sure if Carrie was supposed to be the same girl as the one at the beginning who gets her hair cut by Shane. Definitely worth seeing.

This movie unfortunately is a mess for me. I can see this really cute movie in here somewhere but it is tangled up in so much issues. The script feels like half of it is missing. It doesn't have any "connective tissue" holding the scenes together. Random scenes will just follow each other with no rhyme or reason how we got there. I don't need to be led around by the nose but it would be nice to have some sort of idea why/how things happened. This is also hot helped by the fact this movie moves at a breakneck pace. The message in here was also a little muddy for me. I honestly don't know what it was trying to say. But I appreciate the effort to tell a story like this in 2006 and in countries where these stories are not common.

This movie would have been good if it were not for the totally disjointed and rubbish script that failed to tell a story. The dialog seemed to have been improvised, and the editing was so poor that the scenes totally lack any continuity. The movie is just a complete failure on all levels! It's a shame because the theme is a good one, but the story fails to be told in a coherent manner!

I must admit, to my great shame, that I was also convinced by this crap upon first viewing: I have to admit, like other viewers pointed it out, that it is nicely filmed, that the complexities and subtleties of the love triangle formed by Jonathan, Carrie and Shane, the main characters of the movie, are well-rendered, and that it plays well with the ambiguity about Shane, one of the two male characters of the film, who may unconsciously harbour the same feelings that Jonathan, the other male character, consciously has for him. Everything plays well for almost the entire duration of the movie, until we arrive at a disgusting moment, that all of a sudden struck me after a second viewing and totally ruins the movie: it is the moment when Jonathan is studying at night with Shane lying drunk on the bed and the latter, (it is a little bit hard to describe an obscene act with polite words, but since foul language is prohibited if you want to write a review on IMDb..) literally FORCES HIS WAY INTO HIM, in other words, RAPES HIM: a proof is that Jonathan's scream at this moment is definitely not a scream of pleasure, but a scream of pain. And what stuns me the most is that the following morning, they so ridiculously express their so-called 'feelings' on the beach, as if nothing had happened. What is all the more disgusting is that if Shane had done the same to Carrie, the female character, everyone would have yelled 'RAPE!', but here, it seems to be perfectly admitted, and the only conclusion that can be drawn is that it is a filthy homophobic message, that is to say: 'Oh, this is not surprising, since they are engaged in a homosexual act, it happens all the time, all of them are more or less rapists!' However, as far as I know, RAPE id a CRIME in the vast majority of the countries of this world, liberal or conservative. So, fundamentally, this crap of a movie, and the fact that it was so well-praised, is only the not-so surprising reflection of the fact that, contrarily to what the politically correct speech try to brainwash us with, in recent years, homophobia has become more and more pervasive and is increasing. Thsi is the reason why, after having initially given a 10 to this crap, I changed it, and gave it a 1. which I think is far more appropriate...