Blue Gate Crossing

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!

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.

Dreamy, Romantic, Tender. OK We've been given those on the poster. They are not ones I would use. Instead I'd go with: Adorable, Sweet, Sensitive, Well-acted, Well-directed, Well-written. It was a joy to watch this film.

It took me a few minutes to warm up to the characters, but only a few. We meet the two girls first, a girly-girl who seems to be in control, and a brooding follower. Not much to go on with that. Girly girl spots sensitive boy and wants him, but insists that brooding girl act as the go-between.

The film focuses on the friendship that develops between brooding girl and sensitive boy after that. Brooding girl becomes razor-sharp, adorably mixed up commando teen when paired up with sensitive boy who has fallen in love with her.

This film did a remarkable job of capturing teens as they are: insecure and passionate; as easily hurt as they are to fall in love. They provoke each other without knowing why. One of the many highlights of this film is when the boy and girl, having run out of verbal ammunition, begin a shoving match. It goes on for some time and then the director simply cuts to a scene of the two of them straightening up their surroundings together. The director makes many decisions like that to keep us focused on the big picture: stuff happens, and then something else happens. There's no stopping it.

I have to point out that watching this Taiwanese film with English subtitles added quite a bit to the adorableness of it. For example, after brooding girl sets up sensitive boy with girly-girl, who knows he likes brooding girl, (you have to see the film to see how that happens), sensitive boy walks girly-girl home. After an uncomfortably done good-bye, girly-girl calls out after sensitive boy as he's about to mount his bicycle and says: "Zhang Shihao, (pause) can you date with me?" I don't know exactly what was said in Taiwanese, but that odd translation seemed to capture the moment perfectly.

I smiled from ear to ear while watching this movie from the time sensitive boy was introduced until the very end. This is an exceptionally well done film, off-the-charts-delightful.

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