Standing in the distance, a man and a woman staring at a girl with long hair in a shawl, three boys and girls form a triangular structure. The poster of "Half Understanding" gives people a routine atmosphere of blood spilled, but this is not a stereotypical love triangle in which two women compete for one man. "A different kind of story" shows the difference of this youth film. It is about love, but not limited to love; it is about boys and girls, but not limited to boys and girls.
"The ancient Greeks believed that when humans had four arms, four legs, and a head formed from two faces, we were happy, we were whole. Being so whole, the gods were afraid, and our wholeness would be It hinders our worship of God, so it divides us in two, and let the two separate selves wander alone on the earth, endlessly longing, longing for the other half of our soul."
Ellie, a Chinese-American high school girl, has all the labels of a schoolgirl from the East. She is taciturn, excellent in grades, and not good at dressing up—even a bit old-fashioned. She wears a rigid black frame and a layered shirt hugging her. Traveling around campus with books. She has no friends and has to endure constant bullying and teasing. On the other hand, she is not cowardly. Her mother died. She lives with her father, who has a doctoral degree but has a bad career because she does not speak fluent English. She earns money by writing papers for her classmates in order to live.
Her business scope covers almost the whole class, and it seems that Ellie is the only one who is seriously studying in this joking high school group. It was also because of Ellie's "ghostwriting business" that she got in touch with Paul, this big boy who was a backup winger in the rugby team. Girl writes a love letter.
It's hard to imagine such three people being connected in such a way. Although they live in a parallel world and stay in the same school, they pass by each day without knowing it. Ellie, a Chinese-American girl who was mocked by the school's famous people who took the lead in shouting "Kakcha Kacha Chuchu", Paul, a big boy who was committed to improving the family sausage recipe, and Aster, a beautiful girl who had a famous boyfriend and a group of friends but seemed out of place. These three lines are supposed to be parallel, but they are intertwined because of the troubles of pheromones in adolescence. This plot is indeed dramatic enough, but in the name of youth it seems so real. Just like the explanation of the Greeks on finding the other half of the soul in the title, youth is rampant, but there are traces of all this, because we are endlessly eager to find the other half of the soul.
It's a story in a town where she can't find herself, and when Ellie rides her bike past the church, "Out there are dingoes, wizards, and wicked people, and liars, and liars everywhere. people”; the teacher mentioned in the class “what Sartre said in “Tight Shut”: other people are hell”. As a well-known and beautiful local girl, Esther accepted other girls' scarves, even if she didn't like it, in order to fit in and not be excluded; she acquiesced in marrying Trigg, even if she didn't like him very much; There was a faint smile in the crowded crowd, even if she couldn't fit into this group from the bottom of her heart.
Ellie knocks on the door between the two girls for Paul's ghostwritten "love letter", which is not so much a love letter as a soul letter between two close friends who have a heart-to-heart connection. In their letters, they talked about philosophy, literature, art, about the self and beauty of the world. The letter is not about outright courtship, but two very lonely souls, after wandering in the world for a long time, finally found a similar other half somewhere. Esther replied: I've never felt so understood.
"Understanding" is a word beyond "love". Some people love each other, but they cannot understand each other. In the end, they can only drift away from each other. In our whole life, those we love and those we love are often like passers-by in our life, but very few of us truly understand ourselves. The Chinese say, "Scholars die for those who are confidants". Ellie, who is alone in school, and Esther, who is still lonely in the noisy world, are essentially the same kind of people. Even though they are separated by the unrequited Paul, the real boyfriend Trigg, and the strict religious father, the resonance and tremor of their hearts make them attract each other like magnets.
It's the same with Ellie and Esther, and it's the same with Ellie and Paul. At first, Ellie thought that Paul had a simple mind and developed limbs, and there was absolutely no point in chasing Esther. But sincerity and frankness are the most touching. He played table tennis with Ellie to practice dialogue, and for Esther endured sleepiness to read a book that he had no interest in at all, he was doing his best to "understand" Esther, This is the way he loves.
The expression of love in "Half Understanding" is so straightforward and simple, unlike the adult world full of mutual benefit and reciprocity, the expression of love by teenagers and girls is that I am willing to understand you, and you also understand me, even if we are not the same, but But together they are cracking the formula of love.
When we were young, our confusion and confusion were based on the two aspects of "seeking ourselves" and "seeking understanding". The outlines of young people who have not yet grown up are blurred. What kind of people do you want to be? Dare to be such a person? Does anyone understand why I am the person I am? Successive inquiries one after another makes people wander, fear and even withdraw. Esther was confined to the circle of the small town, and she felt a sense of stability within the circle, but Ellie's voice outside the circle was like the chant of a siren, she yearned and feared the storm of rebellion.
"Half Understanding" is a story about the encounter of two lonely souls, and it is so true to show the confused adolescence that each of us has experienced. But while it is very close to reality, it leaves a romantic reverie: because we were once one, even if the soul is divided into two halves, but I will find you eventually, because only when we are together, life is complete.
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