Eternal Summer (2006)

Eternal Summer (2006)

A moody love triangle that benefits from strong characters on all sides

7.2

Movie

Sweden, Taiwan
Cantonese, Mandarin
Drama, Romance
2006
LESTE CHEN
Joseph Chang, Kate Yeung, Ray Chang
96 min

What it's about

Three high school students experience the perks and pitfalls of love in director Leste Chen’s sensitive tale of friendship and yearning.

The take

Though Eternal Summer isn't able to fully engage with its queer characters—maybe due to its being released in the mid-2000s—it still makes for a more interesting character study than you'd expect. This romance between three school friends has more on its mind than simply pitting two romantic pairings against each other. Unrequited feelings, unspoken secrets, and identities that are constantly in flux make Eternal Summer compelling just for the way these people try to dance around one another's emotions. And since it's shot in the muted colors of early digital filmmaking, this is a love story that becomes all the more melancholic just in the way it looks.

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