East Palace, West Palace (1996)

(Some parents tell their children they hit them because they love them. Some children get this the wrong way. One child grew up believing that being hit is being loved, and to love is to be beaten, hammered and treated like trash. He thinks pain is pleasure and pleasure can only be achieved with pain. We call it the wrong kind of love, but he thinks it's the most beautiful kind of love that the world just misunderstands.)

I watched this because China banned its release. I was curious and the movie proved worthy of that curiosity. It wasn't great, but it was one undeniably beautiful movie. I love the dialogues. Sometimes the lines are rather poetic. The actors could even tell more of the story even with no words at all. The film seemed to glorify the simplicity of its plot with good writing and actors.

Have an open mind upon watching this film, but don't get too attached. It's just a film after all.

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Love

not an easy watch but an illuminating aesthetic and feeling experience〜 not as I expected really a depiction of social attitudes in a homophobic society but an exploration of one man working out his psychological, emotional survival in that society, the fine line between love and hurt 、self-realization and self-disgust、 acceptance and rejection ：who was it who said　”beauty can come out of a dunghill” ? beautiful imagery of nature and the eponymous palace in cinematography and sound ( Chinese opera ) 〜Si Han acted sensitively and convincingly
it is interesting to note that gay love was an accepted part of civilization in China (as in Japan) for hundreds of years ironically persecuted in current supposedly humanitarian times is it really a decaying palace or a decaying society where love is driven into the night and memorials of a past cultured civilization ?

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