BLISS RATING: ★★★★★
“Love may have longest arms, but it can still fall short short of an embrace.” – YourTango
This series displays purity in its story, acting, scenery, and simplicity. It left me speechless, profoundly moved, and almost catatonically depressed at the ending but then will blow your mind way. It was so disorientating and unexpected, that I went from crying profoundly sad tears to crying happy tears. Everyone connected to this series needs to be commended with accolades drifting like manna from heaven raining on all who had anything to do with this gem. It is the closest thing to near perfection I have ever watched on a screen. I have viewed a lot of BL series, but this one took my breath away with its story of absolute love and the simple tenacity it takes to maintain that love. It is a story that is so relatable no matter the country. Its universality of the message of love is unpretentious, basic, and so moving.
I have stated before and shall state it here again, there are good BL series, and then there are great ones. There are countries who produce good, sometimes, ever great series. Then you have leaders, and, in my opinion, the Vietnamese BL series are THE best of any country. None are equal to its ability to tell a story in snippets of slices of life’s experiences so realistically. They are consistently strong with strong acting caliber and share stories that are relatable to common individuals. They are indeed the leaders in storytelling usually in very succinct and tailored episodes. And this is one for the books!
This is a straight-forward basic story of two friends who have lived together for more than 10 years. Thanh Van (Thai Thanh Nhan) and Minh Nhat (Huy Du). Theirs is an unrequited love evident by everyone around them. As the years roll by, Van is the one more conscious of his love for Nhat. He dots over him. Worries about him. And is in emotional torture when he is with his girlfriend, Kheit An (Do Nhat Ha). Ironically, Nhat dots over Van. Worries about him. And is in emotional torture when he thinks Van is in love with Trong Tuong (Hoang Duy), but is not sure why. In other words, neither can ‘see’ the love for each other but they certainly feel it for each other.
Their souls are almost bound to each other and there is a feel and sense of inevitability to their relationship. An tries to drive a wedge between them but the forces of love between the two of them are just too strong and powerful. While she tries to manipulate Nhat into being with her, she eventually realizes that Nhat’s true and only love is with Van. And she senses and is aware that Van’s true and only love is Nhat. She says to Nhat, “You should know what is more important to you to keep. Don’t let us suffer because of ambiguity.” What a brilliant light for direction she gives Nhat to show him what he needs to do. He knows at that point, how deeply he is in love with Van and that it has been so for a long time.
This love story is so beautifully told in such an incredibly short period of time. There are only 5 episodes of around 20 minutes. But they make the most of each precious minute of screen time. Not a minute is wasted. The scenes between the two main actors are filled with angst, pain, yet a sense of connection and yes even love. We as the audience know they are in love even though they do not display it overtly until the end.
One scene in particular is so profoundly moving, I was captivated by its cinematography. It is when Van is cutting onions and Nhat is ready to leave to spend the night with An but he painfully hesitates to leave. Van notices it and tells him to go but as he does, Van continues to cut the onions with such a deep sense of sadness and angst, that it quite literally made me cry. Conversely, Nhat, lacking understanding, is tortured and pained as he wants to spend his time with Van. His entire focus is on Van. This chemistry and connection that they have with one another is what love stories are written about. At the end, when they confess their love for one another, it is not clouded with euphemistic words, nor said with hesitation, or lack of conviction. It is THERE. “I love you’” In raw form and displayed clumsily and awkwardly. It is just brilliant. It is soft, sweet, but incredibly cumbrous. They love each other but neither know how to ‘love’ each other. It is rare that this kind of dichotomy can be seen with the audience and actually feeling it as well. It is just brilliant.
There are no villains nor bad people here. Just humans who sometimes do stupid actions not out of meanness but loyalty to friends or mixed feelings. The poignant scenes are so noteworthy simply for their softness, gentleness, and timing perfection. There is a brilliant scene near the end where An and Tuong sit with each other to commensurate their individual losses in a setting that profoundly reflects what they are going through.
The scene between Van and his mother towards the end is one of the finest emotional scenes in any BL series I have ever seen. His mother overhears Van and Nhat exchange their deep love for each other. She says to Van that she heard everything. “I can’t understand but I believe you are happy with what you choose. That is enough.” I totally lost it here. Bawled like a baby. The mother Di Tu (Dang Phuong Thao), expresses herself with a gentleness yet she is frightened for her son. She is sympathetic yet confused. She is supportive yet not fully understanding what life has in store for them. She does this with intense facial expressions and a sense of compassion that only a mother could convey. The beauty in her face and the gentleness in her voice made her ‘mother’.
Who really S.T.O.L.E. the series? All of them did. In this case, I could not narrow it down to just one. I gave it to Dang Phoung as the mother and Do Nhat Ha as An. Both women were just superb in their own individual ways. The sympathetic and understanding mother and ironically, the sympathetic and understanding girlfriend. While they could have made either an antagonist, they did not. Sure, An tried to convince Nhat to be with her, but it was more of a test to see who he really loved. She knew it was not her and literally forced him to stop being so timid and do the right thing. The mother could have pressured her son to focus solely on the negativity of having a relationship with a man but did not. Both these individual, on the strength of their acting skills, could display the emotions of a mother and a jilted girlfriend with rawness, sometimes anger, fear, yet through it all still displayed the underlying love they have for Van and Nhat.
This story is so much more than what I am describing. It is sad but hopeful. It is melancholic but never depressing. It is soft but never mushy. It is poignant but never sorrowful. The cinematography is outstanding with the surroundings breathtakingly real and relatable to everyday living. Not enough can be said about the acting. It is, simply – memorable. In additional to the actors all being so incredibly handsome, charming, and completely relatable. This will be a series that I shall be with me for a long time. PLEASE, stay to the end of the last episode. Otherwise, you will be unnecessarily destroyed. It was an iconographic twist of resplendence.
This BL series is a masterpiece.
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