You Are the Apple of My Eye
When the credits started rolling, I turned to my friend and the first thing she said while dabbing the tears in her eyes was 'I hate the ending!'. But for me, it was precisely the ending that made me love this otherwise standard school romance/coming-of-age movie.
Let me retrace my steps to the beginning. Shen Jia Yi is a model student and the objection of every guy's affections. Our main guy Ke Teng, the lazy class clown, initially professes not to like her and picks on her for being a goody-two-shoes, but their relationship changes one day when Ke Teng is made to sit in front of Shen Jia Yi and she is tasked with helping him improve his grades. The movie follows their ambiguous friendship from high school to college, and finally to the less-than perfect ending.
I said in my previous post that the set up of 'Apple' is slightly reminiscent of 'Crazy' because Ke Teng strives hard to be a better man for Shen Jia Yi like how Nam did all she could to win Chon's heart but in 'Crazy', I never quite got why Chon fell for Nam, to the point of waiting nine years for her or even why Nam was so obsessed with Chon (aside from the fact that he has Mario's looks. Haaa). In 'Apple', there were a few distinct moments which made me go 'ahhh' and totally understood the changes in Ke Teng and Shen Jia Yi's relationship. I'll just mention a couple of my favourite scenes.
Shen Jia Yi started off regarding Ke Teng as a troublesome responsibility and Ke Teng didn't help with his devil-may-care attitude. Not long after though, she forgot to bring her English textbook on a day where the teacher was feeling particularly pissy and ready to tear apart any student who rubbed her the wrong way. A distressed Shen Jia Yi was about to admit she forgot her textbook when Ke Teng suddenly put his textbook on her table and took the rap for her. In that instant, this boy who made a job out of irritating her then coming to her rescue without any words became different from all the other boys around here.
Later, Ke Teng lost a bet to Shen Jia Yi when he didn't manage to beat her in the exams and one night while they were revising in school as usual, he suddenly took off on his bike in the rain to shave his head to honour his side of the bet. When he came back to the classroom dripping wet sans hair, Shen Jia Yi broke out in giggles at this boy who was always doing the most incredible things. If I had a boy who did this for me, he would have my adolescent heart too.
If they cared so much for each other, why did this story end with Shen Jia Yi walking down the aisle with another man while Ke Teng watched as a guest?
After the wedding ceremony, Ke Teng's buddies who all used to like Shen Jia Yi cheekily asked the groom if they could kiss the bride. The groom agreed with a condition: they had to first kiss the groom in the same way they wanted to kiss the bride. While the guys were making a fuss over the 'unfair' terms, Ke Teng suddenly pounced (yes, literally) on the groom and did some pretty intense kissing. I laughed because it was a comical moment and such a typical Ke Teng thing to do yet my tears could not help falling at the same time when flashbacks showed the moments Ke Teng shared with Shen Jia Yi and all their miss opportunities. Not because of unfortunate coincidences or cruel twist of fate, they missed each other simply because they were immature and not brave enough. If only Ke Teng had the courage to listen to Shen Jia Yi's answer, he would have heard 'ok, let's be together'. Instead, those words floated away with the sky lantern, a moment forever gone. If only Shen Jia Yi hadn't waited for Ke Teng to understand what she really meant when she scolded him for being childish and an idiot. If only Ke Teng had turned back that rainy night to say 'I'm sorry'.
If only.
Weren't we all once like that, insecure and childish in front of the person we liked? Yet in those carefree years of yore, if she only gave you a smile, if he only did something silly for you, it made you feel as if you owned the entire world.
I love this ending because that's how life is. Some things once lost can never be recovered. But you had it. Your beautiful youth, where you dreamt big dreams, where you laughed, cried, loved, fought and finally grew up.
Artistically or creatively speaking, this isn't an exceptional movie but it has resonated with so many people because we all miss those days where we didn't know better. It's funny how I wanted to grow up quickly when I was a awkward teenager but now I often find myself reminiscing about those days. Sign of age? XD