I really wanted to like this movie more than I did
It's not every day that we see a Chinese BL movie, and one that contains some explicit scenes too.However, steamy sex scenes cannot cover up bad writing. While the premise is promising, with an historical-fantasy theme, the execution itself is quite poor. In the first minutes of the film we learn that there are three factions of races in the world - dragons, humans and mermen - and that they are all in constant conflict with one another. Why? that's a great question, but you won't receive a clear answer throughout the movie. The love story between the two main characters develops way too quickly - they go straight from enemies to lovers. There are many more problems with the script other than these two, but I don't want to add any spoilers.
The acting itself was good , considering the story. It seems they all tried to do their best.
The music was not noteworthy. Not bad, but not outstanding either.
Overall I probably won't watch it again. And that's a shame, really, because with better writing it could have been a really great movie.
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1I liked this movie!
So first of all this is a moderate budget Chinese wuxia movie about gay mermaids. I did not go into it with high expectations, and it starts off a bit confusing. But I thought the story they ended up weaving was pretty interesting!In this story, mermaids can make special silk and their tears are pearls. They are trafficked by humans as a source of wealth as a result. And because they are enslaved and tortured to force them to produce silk and pearls, they sometimes fight back.
Because they are seen as a danger to humans, it is illegal to keep them and if someone is caught keeping one both the mermaid and the human should be executed by law.
But when Yuanshan finds the merman Yixia at the scene of a murder, for some reason he spares his life.
The plot is pretty complex, with a fight for the succession to the throne, Yuanshan's wife being a princess, her brother having a dragon beast spreading around bad dragon qi, and Yixia being so cute and irresistible. What is a minister of justice to do?
The ending is also an absolute trip.
Anyway understand this isn't a high budget movie and set expectations accordingly, enjoy the gay mermaid fun.
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This review may contain spoilers
interesting yet very confusing
Che YuanShan who is a main, is more of a bad-guy in my eyes. like i get he got a job to do - but shouldn't one who is a minister of justice, meet out freakin justice? here he was killing mer-people left right and center, and they were the victim's. the law of killing the whole family who kept mer-people as slaves was logical, cause they were keeping freakin slaves and considering how the mer-people made silk and pearls - they were basically tortured on the daily - logically they killed their "masters" who wouldn't?!? so as a preventive measure, this harsh law was created.donno what connection there was between Che YuanShan and Yixia (as seeing Yixia - brought on flashes of their being together in the future and that's why Che YuanShan didn't kill Yixia) but nothing was explained after that.
Yixia being a mer-prince on the run, and feeling obligated to Che YuanShan from saving him twice (once in that ministers house, and then from the dragon dude) i get him helping save him, when he got hurt the first time - but after him witnessing how Che YuanShan meted out "justice" ruthlessly, killing innocents - him trying to assassinate him, i get - but how that turn into a make-out session?!? how from "i hate ur guts cause u a merciless murdered of my people", turn into "i'm sorry i hurt u, i love u - promise to never desert me..." ?!???? like talk about a reach - him falling for Che YuanShan in the blink of an eye, was out of nowhere.
a lot of the plot was one scenario to the other, without much explaining in the middle or some sort of intro, so it would flow and make sense - so Yixia going from being a run away mer-prince that said his kingdom doesn't exist - being abandoned by Che YuanShan too then seeing him back in a kingdom he said doesn't exist - training? fighting to get back to Che YuanShan's city, to seek vengeance for the abandonment - to then AGAIN save Che YuanShan's life, is like WTF is going on...
the cherry on top - this was all a movie and the actor playing Che YuanShan - or the real dude, got eternal life cause of the last "save" and even though Yixia spirt/life source/soul is in Che YuanShan making him immortal - there is another Yixia in present times(?!?) and at the end of the movie, Che YuanShan and Yixia meet at last - and its like WHAT - where that come from. like talk about this plot being all over the place - so as i started out this review, was interesting but also very confusing...
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A Good Watch
This is actually a nice movie.I love how the small details of him being a mermaid and the value of his tears, blood and soul and that secret connects to the story flow and the ending. Even though the latter part of the movie was a bit hasty, and lots of holes in the plot, I pretty much enjoyed it. Could've been appreciated more if they made this into a mini series with 20 mins or less per episode instead of an hour long movie. Anyway, still a good watch if you just won't expect that much and appreciate it more.
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This review may contain spoilers
Reviewing because I personally don't agree with the really bad reviews, but hey everyone is different so it's fine but I just wanted to give my own thoughts.SPOILER SPOILER SPOILER
First off, yes the direction is not perfect, nor the writing but I feel like I was still into it, and watched without getting bored.
A mermaid named Yixia gets saved by this guy who's a minister Yuanshan and married into the royal family and then things happen and Yuanshan falls for the mermaid pretty hard and cheats on his wife.
But there's a Dragon, a monster chasing the mermaid and trying to kill him but Yuanshan saves him again, but his wife ends up dying.
And so Yuanshan ends up abandoning Yixia, because there are other things happening in the background.
He's basically the person who becomes the guy who will be next on the throne because the current Prince is just so bad, doing all kinds of dumb things like hiring the same monster Dragon as his confidant.
But when Yuanshan abandons Yixia who is immortal by the way, he's hurt but comes back to face Yuanshan after three years.
By then things have severely escalated.
And when Yixia learns that despite abandoning him, Yuanshan actually does love him, he becomes emotional again and says he's going to protect Yuanshan with his life and we literally see Yixia go inside Yuanshan (no pun intended lol) and then we find out that Yuanshan now basically has the mermaids power and he has the mermaids jade silk in his hand as he lays on the bloody ground.
MAJOR ENDING SPOILER
Okay now for the controversial ending.
When I first saw someone say 'cut' and 'Yuanshan' takes off his wig and we see the historical movie set and the others actors etc are all interacting but Yuanshan just takes his food and goes to sit to one side like a loner.
Ngl I did feel cheated at first because I was like wth is this meta shit lol
Buuut hear me out.
I thought this for maybe two seconds till 'Yuanshan' or the actor playing Yuanshan still carrying the Jade silk in his hand, goes towards the ancient building which is where the movie was being shot, and he's going there as if in a daze and then we see all the love making scenes again, the one in the bathroom and in bed with the red sheets as though Yuanshan is remembering it and then finally we see him getting a little emotional, and then he just stands at this one point and gets tears in his eyes, until we see someone put their hand on Yuanshans shoulder - and then it's revealed that that person who was carrying a camera, was none other than Yixia.
Well, here's my interpretation.
Because of the Mermaid's powers, Yuanshan is now immortal like Yixia, and it wasn't an actor but the same Yuanshan and those scenes were his own memories from all those years ago.
Clearly Yixia also survived somehow, or maybe it was just his desire, to see Yixia, I don't know, but personally I feel like they're showing that their love basically transcends the boundaries of time and life.
So you tell me how it's not at least a little poetic?
Like I said the execution may not be great but for one things there's skin ship in this one that is just so good! Like full on proper Thai BLs level skin ship! You should at least give it a way h for this alone xD
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Loved the chemistry between the leads, nothing felt awkward to me. Though i wish there was a bit more storyline to the ML.
That being said, it did have It's fair share of issues, especially the ending. It left me feeling extremely confused. I really wish it had ended better or explained the reason for that. Lol. I feel like I've been mind fucked.
For a low budget film, I think it was hella good though. Just needs some kinks worked out.
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Beautiful story of enduring GL
For me the main virtue of this short GL Chinese movie is that it actually contains openly gay scenes 🏳️🌈 maybe just escaping the Chinese homophobic censorship〜 the story is nothing unusual of its genre except possibly the green blood❇️ and the mermaids of the title seem different from humans only by this and their possibly more ethereal makeup and clothing〜〜 but indisputably the best part of the movie is the end： brilliant original unexpected moving and beautiful with the music overpowering me with emotion 💕🔆(♡ᵉ̷͈ัॢωᵉ̷͈ัॢ )‧₊°♡
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This review may contain spoilers
Beautiful mermaid man - YES!
I liked the premise of the plot. It promised a chinese fairy tale with boys love and I was hooked.Long hair, fine Hanfus, wonderful places.
I really enjoyed the wuxia vibes and the acting was good, so sometimes I really forgot that I was viewing a piece of drama. The desire of Minister of Criminal Justice was clearly felt.
The red sheets.... damn, that was such a beautiful artistic representation of physical intimacy.
Cinematographic it was a joy to watch. And even if the story had it's holes, I liked it, so I could oversee them.
It's a story, finely told, between the lines. The sadness and the longing has catched me.
Okay, it's an open ending, but that will let room for fantasy.
Only one thing drove me to despair: The wig installation killed the illusion.... guys, the glue... I cried...
watched it on YouTube (no longer available)
now on GagaOOLala
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I like historical Chinese films
I like historical Chinese films, spiced with a mystical and even fairy tale story and spiced with subtle BL relationships between the men of that time, and I want to thank you for the translation into Slovak. Here at gaytitulky.info, several such films are listed (China, Korea), but Han Zi Gao's film The Male Queen and The Untamed with a rating of 9.1 on MDL are missing here. Mermaid's Jade even boasts some minor BL scenes that I didn't even count on, apparently it got past Chinese censorship as a relationship between a minister and a mermaid (but it was a mermaid ha ha). Good acting, story a little rushed (but I don't mind at all) and a surprise ending that no one expects, with beautiful music and you can kind of guess the ending or rethink the story, which for me was the most amazing ending. For me, very beautiful, deep and I would like to watch it again sometime.Was this review helpful to you?
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all over the place
i don't know what else to say beside what other reviews said, it's just messy. It has fairly good cinematography, i can see someone being attracted to this movie based on screencaps but.. chemistry or some kind of fluid character development between characters is nonexistent, there is no logic, effects were bad (but that was to be expected) and what bothered me a lot was the badly covered up wigs lol. Gotta say i had a good laugh at the very end though. And the ML also looks better without wigWas this review helpful to you?
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SUPER-BLAND LIKE A SOUP WITHOUT SEASONING
So, I came across this movie as an explicit BL and the storyline seemed intriguing soI decided to give it a try. But oh, it's just so BLAND. THE STORY WASN'T BAD, IT DID HAVE POTENTIAL BUT IT SHOULD HAVE BEEN DEVELOPED INTO A DRAMA. AS A MOVIE, IT WAS SUPER RUSHED. THE ACTING WAS BAD, PLUS THE SUPER FAST PACING MADE IT IMPOSSIBLE TO CONNECT WITH THE CHARECTERS OR THE STORY. EVERYTHING HAPPENED SO FAST! OVERALL, THERE'S NOTHING TO LIKE IN IT.The ACTING WAS POOR, DIRECTING WAS POOR. ONLY THING I LIKED IS THE ENDING (LOL) WHEN THEY REINCARNATED. SUCH STORIES SHOULD BE DEVELOPED INTO SERIES WITH A GOOD CAST.
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