I had a high expectation of this movie, but all of my expectation was clearly devoured by the movie itself.
It's such a gem and yet another pain in the ass. I barely moved on from finishing the story and all I hope is another worthy movie to be expected, but I don't have a list at all up until now.
Anyway, let me introduce you to the movie itself, and warning, it would definitely contain spoilers!
It's "Your Name Engraved Herein". Whose name? Of course it's Birdy and Jia Han. Yes, t's indeed another BL movie! And I'd be delighted to tell you many times that this movie was a top tier.
Shall we take a look of the synopsi, cited from Mydramalist, first?
In 1987 when the martial law period ended, two Christian high-school students, Jia Han and Birdy, met at the school band led by a Canadian priest. One day, they were granted a day off to Taipei for the late president’s funeral. The two took a chance to explore the city and theaters, finding themselves inspired by brotherly love and freedom.
Days after, Jia Han’s affection for Birdy has been awakened, but a much-confused Birdy pushed him away by pretending to fall in love with a girl. The misunderstanding separated them ever since until three decades later, when the two men met again in a foreign city.
Well,
I loved every part of it.
If I said previously that I only watched specific type of BL story and had my own preference of selecting the title, YNEH was the best definition of it.
1. The main leads were hottie with excellent acting and great chemistry. There's no rule or indication which one was the seme/uke. Both were males who just happened to be in love.
2. It portrayed the coming-of-age and sexuality crisis in a very emotional way. It successfully delivered all the emotions. Confusion, heartbreak, depression, pain, anger, and love were everything that you would feel during the scenes.
3. It showed the struggle when the society were against homosexuals. Additionally, it involved the religious side too.
4. The state-of-art cinematography. Each setting and atmosphere were brilliantly represented the emotions of each scene.
5. Great soundtracks that could even enhance the emotions more.
6. It's based on a real story.
If I could choose a word only to describe the movie, then it would be:
Painfully beautiful.
Yes, it's beautiful, too beautiful if I must say. Every part of it was too beautiful to define. The main leads. The story. The dialogue. The acting. The setting. The music. Everything.
And yes, it's actually too painful. I could feel a lot of confusion during the first part, and it somehow turned to anger and misery to the end. Afterwards, you could even feel the void, it's as if you shut off your ability to feel so you would not feel the pain anymore.
As I said on previous post too, I did not complaint for the ending but only for the selection of the actors that portrayed the older version of the main leads. They did not look alike at all. But again, I reminded on an interview with the Director, he had his own purpose on selecting the actors, and it made senses.
As the younger version of Jia Han and Birdy were such a hottie and eye candy, 30 years later they both changed into unattractive person, that would make us feel sorry on how they wasted their prime time not to love each other. Additionally, I had another opinion after watching it several times that, their older version made the story looked realistic, as if it happened to some people in real life.
Yes, I have watched many times already and making this post was actually just another reason for me to rewatch it.
So this time, let me do the walk-through of some memorable scenes, well actually I did not really put all of my favorites scene here, but let's talk a look first.
This was when Jia Han reminisced how he's attracted to Birdy, and to introduce how the man came into his life. It was very intense, I could not even make a sound while watched the scene.
This was when their first trip together. At the last picture it was when Jia Han looked into Birdy, there were some emotions in Jia Han's eyes I could not describe. BTW, I noticed on how the movie had less dialogue but all the words from each character's mouth were all gems.
Yes, still during the trip. Could you notice on the effort to set the color palette based on the mood they purposely intended? This "red" scene was full of tension. I could not even breathe properly. This movie was one of those who need to watch in silent and full of focus because of the emotions.
There were a lot of flashbacks and even the timeline of the plot itself were unstructured. But that's what made it more beautiful. Like the story was started during Jia Han conversation with the pastor, and I was expecting when it was occurred, during which time actually. And also, their conversation and whatever came from Jia Han during the time was all worth to quote.
This one below was the proof on how Jia Han was a religious person and he acknowledged that his feeling was a sin. Yes, another intense scene.
During the scene below, Jia Han was talking to the schoolmate who was bullied because he's gay. I loved it too because I thought it's also a great courage for Jia Han to ask and unintentionally revealed that he's gay too. It's also a breakthrough that he knew that he loved Birdy, not just "any" boy. He was shocked when the other made a move on him.
As the synopsis told, Birdy was approaching a girl and Jia Han was getting jealous. He showed it too much. I did not know what to say, he's not that another sad boy who only knew how to torture himself in silence. He showed clearly how jealous he was.
And Birdy... Oh Birdy... I could not even blame him since I knew what he was doing was to protect Jia Han too. They were just living in a wrong time at a wrong place though.
Then during the conversation with pastor, it explained that Jia Han felt joy, thrill, cares, and also, jealousy. He felt everything when someone in love. It was love, but it was to be understood also that he was confused too. Or perhaps, he regretted himself.
This also proved on how deep his feeling to Birdy was actually. It's not just a shallow feeling at all. It's not only lust or curiosity. It's love, a pure love.
Truthfully, since I captured the moment while re-watched the movie, after above scene I got too carried away and almost forgot to snap again. That was when the conflicts arose and heartbreaking at the same time. I cried, more and more until its climax which was below scene. It was when they fought in front of Jia Han's parents. It's too thrilling when the parents had no idea on what they were talking about (actually) and how they talked about themselves in front of others.
It's so heartbreaking to see their story from Jia Han's point of view. He must be very confused, he wanted to fight for love, but the other party was pushing him too harshly.
Furthermore, as the climax had passed, it became more heartbreaking than ever. And yes, during the scene below, what Birdy said was true. Jia Han was going nowhere, he stayed. He never moved on from Birdy at all, at the very end, which was distressful.
Anyway, I did not really spoil too much as I expected. It's really worth to watch so I hope you cherish this movie like I do!
As a bonus, I took a snap purposely at this scene, at this specific lyric, which the moment that I loved the most. Anyway, I cried at this scene loudest, without really knowing why.
In conclusion,
Cast/Acting 10 of 10
Story 10 of 10
Music 10 of 10
Rewatch Value 10 of 10 (ABSOLUTELY)
Please watch it if you want to witness this great love story ever!
Side note:
I was glad this movie was released on Netflix at the end of 2020. It really made a whole different impression of 2020. This was the best gift that 2020 gave me during the year, actually.
