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mikemcdo
Reviews
Life: Senjou no Bokura (2020)
True Love probably looks like this...
This story draws you in, feels realistic and not like a Hollywood "tear jerker" or romantic fantasy. Two outsiders meet by chance, friendship evolves into love, of course with challenges ahead. The couples connection feels authentic. Issues of social and family expectations also evolve. But doesn't love involve a range of emotions and introduce many new experiences, adding to life's colour and adventure? But is "true love" really different to other forms of love? If such a construct could be reality based, I suspect this story portrays something like it. Love cannot be measured objectively and yet it is a very real experience for many/most of us; perhaps life's greatest adventure! Life on the line is a terrific metaphor used by this film. It totally captivated me and left me feeling I had just experienced something wonderful; 10/10!
Thua me con di (2019)
Brilliant!
Excellent movie on all levels, issues relating to family, society and love are brilliantly interwoven. Shocked to read some so-called film reviewers identifying this film as a comedy, but there is nothing at all comical in this film; the grandmother has dementia and this is certainly not a comical subject. In fact, her character is wonderful and even though having dementia, she is the only one who can see an important truth. Just Brilliant! This is a film showing gay people as having real relationships that are loving and part of a loving family life. I also loved the scenes of Viet Nam and Vietnamese culture. I could write a PhD on this film, I think it is a work of genius. I have watched it now several times and still find things I missed. It easily gets a perfect 10 score from me!
Stay with me (2023)
Nice until the end
Cute family relationship story displaying that after initial antagonism, a gradual development of a closer than usual friendship between two school boys occurs. A type of love appears to emerge between them, certainly anything but a gay friendship, but this culminates in tragedy in the end. Just like Hollywood films in the past, portraying versions of same sex attraction always ending in "justifiable" killing of the deviates in the end. The interesting thing about this rather long series is that a lot of time, effort and money obviously went into making it. But do tragic endings at the end of long stories really appeal to audiences? The IMDb scores suggest otherwise.
Hana wa sakuka (2018)
Marlboro Country
Lovely film badly scarred by Marlboro advertising, how can a Director compromise their art for the blood stained money of Big Tobacco, especially in the twenty first century.
Grey Rainbow (2016)
Definitely not a positive gay film!
The story line, a cliche'
A focus on the relationship building but after they get together, one drops dead actually at the point of taking vows in the wedding ceremony, nasty, pointless, and like so many Hollywood films have done to us for years, we are always portrayed as tragic or comic and die in the end. Perhaps that was really the point this writer/film-maker had, give us a "nice" fluffy romance and kill one off. Even Dr Freud would likely see something perhaps unconsciously punishing towards this sort of unaccepted love.