Over a year after Taiwan became the first Asian country to legalize gay marriage, this LGBT instant classic premiered in Taiwanese cinemas and on then on Netflix (although production started way back in 2018, when legislation was still a controversial issue). Director Patrick Kuang-Hui Liu has stated that he did not intend to make a gay film, rather a "personal" one, about his experiences as a closeted gay man born in 70s Taiwan.
This is about my first love, and my first love happened to be a story of a boy liking another boy.
For the first in a very long time, the general public in and outside Taiwan has embraced the film with open arms, not simply because of its theme but the technical beauty the film possessed, effectively resonating with all audiences about the feeling of falling in love in an unforgiving place and time. Helmed by an incredible performance by newcomer Edward Chen, Your Name is mainly from the perfective of A-han, and the alienation he feels when he realizes he is falling in love with his best friend Birdy, played by Tseng Jing-hua.
每個人的初戀，都跟史詩電影一樣偉大 Everyone's first love is as great as an epic movie.
The idea of interspersing a confessional on most part of the film is a genius idea by the Liu in my opinion, as this is where most of the memorable lines are spoken, charging up A-han's frustrations about how uncontrollable his feelings have become, and emphasizing a later revelation that the person he is confiding in, Father Oliver, is also actually gay and understood his feelings completely, but is genuinely unable to say the right words as he himself have not gotten past that part of his personality yet.
你喜歡女生就可以，我喜歡男生就不行。你有多愛一點，我有少愛一點嗎？ Is your love bigger than the love I give? Tell me, what's the difference between your love and mine?
Birdy may on the surface play along the lines of the manic pixie dream boy trope, but his character is as complex as that of A-han, as well. When the two boys travel to Taipei, we become onlookers of how A-han slowly falls for Birdy's charm, and untapped artistic spirit. It is one of those scene where we as an audience get to feel again how to fall in love with someone after realizing we have earned a glimpse into someone's soul, Birdy's passion, through A-han's eyes. Later during their reunion and the painful telephone scene, we realize that A-han is not the only one going through the same confusion.
如果你給別人的，跟給我的是一樣的，那我就不要了 If what you give to others is the same as what you give me, then I don't want it.
Personally I was afraid the film would do a Brokeback Mountain and fast forward into a middle aged A-han finding out Birdy has died without giving their feelings a chance. It did half of that, when the older gentlemen reunite in Canada after years of not seeing each other, now grey and worn out, after a lifetime apart from each other, but with greater freedom to be honest. Full disclosure, I hate these scenes because they make me so sad. Especially when it pans to a younger, carefree version of themselves before everything went downhill. How I wish we could feel what A-han feels, after all those years, remains a faithful heart to the boy who shaped the person he became. Unfortunately, life doesn't seem to work that way. We are designed to outgrow these things and move on to adulthood. This is probably the answer to the Birdy's rhetorical "Don't you think things are more fun in the movies than in real life?".
Profiter du moment.
It beckons us to think after a decade, when we're all older and the world has changed so much, who will be that one person we will want to walk side by side on a cold Canada night? What will you say? How will they react to see you again? Fools rush in where angels fear to tread.
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