Search - Blue Gate Crossing on DVD

A terrific film few in the U.S. saw

02/23/2004

(5 out of 5 stars)

"While this charming coming-of-age movie barely surfaced in U.S. theaters, moviegoers will finally have the chance to catch up with it on video. Unlike many heavy-handed queer films of the last decade that deal with a young person's coming-out, this movie gets the awkwardness, the pain, the humor, and the affection just right. It made the Advocate's Top Ten Films of 2003 list, and rightfully so. Give it a shot!"

A Quiet, Delicate Look at Lesbianism in Taiwan

Daitokuji31 | Black Glass | 04/26/2008

(5 out of 5 stars)

"Of recent, I have watched a number of Taiwanese films that deal with the subject of homosexuality. Films such as Go, Go, G-Boys are vapid, fun films that are more concerned with giving their audiences a lot of eye candy instead of taking issue of homosexuality seriously in a land where a number of gays and lesbians feel it necessary to keep their sexuality hidden, while films like Spider Lilies and Eternal Summer take the subject a bit more seriously and show the struggles of young people coming to terms with their sexuality, a sexuality that might not be accepted by society as a whole. Blue Gate Crossing, which was released a few years before these other films, takes the latter viewpoint and also asks the question, what if the object of one's affections does have the same sexual orientation as one?

Although a bright and happy girl, Lin Yuezhen is unable to express her affection to the boy who makes her weak in the knees: Zhang Shihao. Instead, she worships him at a distance and collects items that once belonged to him, such as a basketball, a pair of swimming goggles, and empty water bottles. She is so timid that she is unable to approach, and instead takes secret photos of him. However, one night, along with her sullen, short-haired friend Meng Kerou, she goes to the school's pool where she knows Zhang Shihao swims every night. However, when Meng Kerou calls out to the young man, Lin Yuezhen disappears. Meng Kerou and Zhang Shihao talk, and before too much longer, the young man begins to develop a crush on Meng Kerou and believes that she made up Lin Yuezhen to get close to him. After constantly hounding her, Meng Kerou begins to go out with Zhang Shihao while Lin Yuezhen steps aside in bitterness. However, Meng Kerou is unable to love Zhang Shihao, because there is someone else she loves, someone with whom she has been close to for a very long time.

Blue Gate Crossing is a quiet, understated film that does not harp on its core theme of homosexuality to draw attention to it. While the actresses in Spider Lilies are quite attractive, the girls in Blue Gate Crossing are quite normal and no undue attention is drawn to sex scenes. Instead what the film gives the audience is a depiction of the difficulties of coming out and being honest with oneself and those around one. Highly recommended."

Teenage coming out, coming of age in Taiwan

abqbeach | Albuquerque, NM USA | 05/14/2005

(5 out of 5 stars)

"For many of us, the teenage coming out, coming of age story has been done again and again, but Blue Gate Crossing is a sweet addition to these kinds of storylines, with the added interest of being set in Taiwan.

Meng Kerou (Lun-mei Guey) and Lin Yuezhen (Shu-hui Liang) are best friends and high school students in Taipei. Yuezhen has a crush on Zhang Shihao (Bo-lin Chen), a boy in their school, but it's Kerou who goes to talk to him on Yuezhen's behalf. Shihao thinks it's Kerou who likes him, so things become a bit of a mess when he begins to like her. At the same time, Kerou is realizing that it's Yuezhen that she's fallen in love with.

It's a very innocent story of young love. Shihao becomes a good friend to Kerou too. He's the kind of boy who's very sweet and likable and a big part of making this film work. Yuezhen, on the other hand, lives in a sort of fantasy world and chooses to ignore it when Kerou kisses her. Kerou's heart breaks, but she ends up happy and more sure of herself and her sexuality, regardless of Yuezhen's reaction.

Nominated for Best Asian Film at the Hong Kong Film Awards."

"If in the next year, or the next 3 years, you start liking

Hansel | Singapore | 09/19/2006

(5 out of 5 stars)

"This film is so good I feel compelled to write a review.

The plot is rather simple involving 2 girls and a boy: Girl A likes Boy, Boy likes Girl B and Girl B likes Girl A.

What is so captivating about this film is that it is so beautifully shot that any shot you take it could be on the publicity poster.

And there is a certain quiet quality to it. It has no melodrama but the honest protrayal of teenage angst and uncertainty will grip you in your chest right from the start of the film till the end. A heart-rending pain not allowing one to breathe, not intense enough to cry over but a pain so slow and insidious that it would stay within one for days before one could expunge it out.

And the dialogue. There must be only about a hundred lines of exchange but every line - and many of them repeated - shows the repression of emotions, the fear if they are spoken out loud so the protagonists write on the walls, write on notebooks and burn them, write in sands to be washed by the waves.

i've been watching Chinese films since I was five. I have never seen a more beautiful Chinese film before. Even Ang Lee and Zhang Yimou aren't this good."