Story is OK. The actor who played the painter veered between detachment (for his 'girlfriend') and affection (for the boy). The attention he paid towards the boy as the plot unfolded would indicate beyond a shadow of a doubt that he was in love. Which makes the ending monologue spoken by the painter rather confusing and leaves the viewer guessing whether he loved the boy or he did not? Why the sudden u-turn? I don't understand Mandarin and maybe the subtitles was badly translated, but he said something like "We are not lovers". So what exactly did he mean by that and how did it add to the conclusion? I would have preferred the movie ending either with the two becoming lovers or becoming friends. Yes, life can be simple. It's only in movies when things become unnecessarily muddled.
Now this is what I call a highly watchable movie, with a beautifully crafted plot and a commendable cast. True, the ending could have been different (in other words better) with the two leads living happily after, but that was what everyone was hoping for anyway, but the scriptwriter/director had preferred to deliver something more melancholic, less predictable. Still, we are shown that the younger man was happy, as was the older man, although they 'lost' each other as lovers. It would have been nice if they had used Carlson Cheng's "Love is shaking in the world" in the end scene :)
I wish movies would give us a real ending, one that is either a good one or a bad one. What I find unacceptable are inconclusive or deliberately confusing endings which maybe only the script writers themselves understand (or maybe not). Good or bad endings need not always be predictable, even if the rest of the story is. They can be cleverly written. The fact that such an ending is absent in this series demonstrates, if nothing else, the ineptness of the script-writing. The storyline is also disconnected in parts, but you tend to overlook these glaring faults, because the first few acts are fun to watch. Stinky ending, followed by a clueless 'post-ending' 11 minute clip. Why did they even bother with the last one?
I like the ambiguous chemistry between the two male leads, but anyone hoping for anything to happen between them ought to take note that this series cannot be described as BL, so don't set your hopes too high! The canned laughter and slapstick sound effects are, to me, an unnecessary distraction and worse, they sometimes come on at inappropriate moments. The laughter especially sounds very obviously fake, since they start and end abruptly. The incidental music is also out of place with some of the scenes. The theme song is not bad but is typical of most contemporary Thai series. Watch this series once and then move on to the next series.
