I saw this movie aboard the plane when I flew back from Beijing to Amsterdam. I saw it on a very bad small 10" (or so) screen, with crackly sound and with a lot of annoying kids around me.Still I have not enjoyed a movie this much for quite some time. It's much -and I really mean MUCH- better than most of the stuff Hollywood chunks out and I bought it on DVD the day I got back! For everyone who has ever felt the feeling of losing a love or having an unreachable love, this movie will be very recognizable. It greatly depicts the pain and suffering that can come from true love and although the movie isn't always as easy to follow, it will captivate you and keep you hooked right up to the end.Apart from the wonderful story, the great backgrounds and superb acting made me an instant fan of Asian cinema. I'd seen a couple of more well known Asian films (like Il Mare for example), but this one opened my eyes entirely. I hope to see more movies like this soon and I recommend it to anyone who can appreciate a good love story!

I've recently watched Perhaps Love again, and the film was even more beautiful the second time around. I've come to find that there are very very few films that successfully capture the struggle of love on-screen, so I was very (and pleasantly) surprised that an Asian film managed it so well. The chemistry between the actors felt real and I loved the soundtrack! Probably the weak points were the choreography and the effects (especially the ending sequence).Btw, the director, Peter Chan, has stressed in interviews that Perhaps Love is NOT a musical, but a love story, so viewers shouldn't be going in and expecting a fare like Moulin Rouge.I liked the way reality and illusions, past and present, were hard to separate in the movie (eg no different usage of colors), because it reflected the inner struggle of the characters; Sun Na, who refuses to believe that her past affects her present; Nie Wen, who thinks that illusions can solve reality's problems; Jian Dong, who cannot separate the past from the present.The saddest part was when Sun Na, after receiving her memoir from Monty, recalled the film that Nie Wen had always wanted to make -- "a simple love story" -- and she said "If that film was ever made, I've always wanted to be in that film...", which reflected her inner yearning for a simple love story of her own, but it never came true. But why did she disagree so strongly with the location of that film that Nie Wen said it would be filmed at? (Qingdao? and Qinghai?, sorry can't remember the exact names) Perhaps it's because even though Nie Wen and Sun Na longed for the same thing in a whole, they also longed for different things that they could not agree upon.There are so many things to discuss about the movie, but I think most of it is subjective; if you know how much love can confuse, hurt, give hope and stumble, you'd probably like Perhaps Love too. Words won't do it justice! All in all, Peter Chan did a great job in capturing the emotions of the characters. Worth a second and third watch!

I watched this movie during its recent release in Singapore. I'm not particular musical fan. But this movie is really worth to watch. It's simple story, about love triangle, but I guess the credit goes to its wonderful, simple and touching delivery. Its flashback delivery makes this movie unique. Frankly speaking, it was kinda confusing at the beginning but as the story flows, you may feel the movie touch slowly. Started with how Lin Jian Dong (starting Takeshi Kaneshiro) acts together with Sun Na (starring Zhou Xun) in musical love triangle show, that actually tells the story about their love journey a decade ago. And the movie director Nie Wen (starring Jacky Cheung)trapped in love triangle between the lead actor and actress.With Takeshi's handsome face, Zhou Xun's good acting and not to mention Jacky Cheung's beautiful and clear voice, it's indeed a good movie to catch!

I love musicals.. somehow I have doubts for this one.I expected to see a musical, albeit one without any plots. Musicals are born that way, actors sing to what they suddenly feel like. If you look for a plot in a musical, you're going into the wrong movie.However, this film is.. I can't describe really what it is. It's a musical, yes, and there's a story. I didn't like the way the music is performed in the movie, though. They depended too much on the play-within-play idea to present the music. All the musical performances happened within the 'film' that the three characters were involved in. You can see that whenever the characters are singing, they are doing it in the 'film', and not in the real life situation. I was expecting a performance to come out from the feeling of that character - like Chicago, when Roxie feels like it, she would suddenly sing to the tune 'Roxie Hart' - of course then the song "All That Jazz" is still done in a 'performance' within the movie. In fact, Tsai MingLiang's The Wayward Cloud, sex and other things aside, would make a better musical - the leads would suddenly change clothings and sing whenever they feel like it.Am i making sense here? Instead of that sort of thing, I wish that the characters would just sing when they're happy (like that scene in "Singing in the Rain") or when they feel sad, and not doing it because the characters are 'in a movie set'. It just takes the notion of Musical away. Yes, there is a plot, probably better than other musicals, but then the plot is not strong enough on its own. The music is great, at times touching. Jacky Cheung is an amazing singer, and I didn't know Takeshi could sing that well either (plus good looking and can speak canto, oh my..) The slow love songs are the most beautiful. The cinematography are obviously beautiful and carefully arranged. There are many dancing scenes that are nicely choreographed (except that I wished the singers would dance with the background dancers too, instead of them singing in the middle, doing nothing). I wished also that there would be more singing done by more characters instead of just Jacky or Takeshi, and the other Korean guy, whats his name..? Nevertheless, its a really good try by an Asian director trying to go global. I just wished it would be less Broadway and more unique Chinese/Asian (the setting are all 20s Harlem sort of feel).And I also really wished there were more people singing. I like the Korean guy's character because he's exactly what musical is all about - who that person is doesn't matter, what matters is that he sings whenever he wants to! So I think it's a good watch, just to see how Asia can make a musical, too. Plus, the music/costumes/set/cinematography are just too nice to miss.