Movie Summary [Permanent Residence]

Title: Permanent Residence / 永久居留
Release Date: 2009
Language: Cantonese
English subs avaliable? – Yes

Cast:
(actor – Character)
Osman Hung – Windson
Sean Li – Ivan
Jackie Chow – Josh Aviv
Lau Yu Hong – Nam

Basic Plot Review:
After meeting at the gym Ivan and Windson form a pretty deep friendship which Ivan wants to develop into a long term relationship. Windson is aware of his feelings but cannot fully reciprocate, Ivan settles for a close friendship that is limited to nothing more than kissing and casual fondling. But when Windson announces his plans to marry his girlfriend, Ivan is totally devastated he leaves to go on a journey to Israel, Thailand and Australia….

What to expect:
A close friendship, possible lovers and sad sad sad ending. (box of tissues should be close by)
Oh! Nudity! A hell of a lot of nudity!
Watch out for dem nakkid bodyz

My Thoughts:

THIS POST CONTAINS SPOILERS

The first time I watched this film I didn’t like it, now that I’ve seen it again I can’t quite understand why that is.
Admittedly I wasn’t blown away by it the second time either, but I did enjoy it – as much as anyone could enjoy having their heart smashed with a sledge hammer but I digress.

I was only able to understand half of this film, when I got about an hour into it the subtitles decided that they didn’t want to work. You know when they say “it’s better to have loved and lost than never to have loved at all”, this cannot be applied to subtitles. It’s better to have never had subtitles than to have them cruelly snatched from your arms.
But anyway…no subtitles…yeah, so I had no idea what anyone was talking about for the last half of the film (excluding the scenes where they speak English).

I really liked the concept of mortality, as good ol’ Wikipedia says this film “examines the limit of life” which is 100% accurate, this film does in fact do that. It’s also “semi autobiographical” and I personally liked how we followed Ivan from his childhood to his eventual death.

Previously I rated it  3/10 but I’m going to bump that up to a 6/10. There are so many of you out there who would watch this film and thoroughly enjoy it’s realistic yet sad scenes but for me, I need to be in the mood to watch something that could ultimately cause an emotional breakdown. Some scenes were little awkward to watch (surprisingly I’m not talking about the scenes when everyone is wandering around naked) and I had to ask myself “would people really do that?”
But anyway, 6/10

Screencaps:

Original post: 27th February 2012
Updated 25th August 2013

Moved  5th May 2020
 

Copyright held by the film company; claimed as fair use regardless.
Purpose of use: illustrate and display the film