404 Still Remain (Korean)

Set in 2001, right at the start of the new millennium, this one's a gentle little coming of age story about two guys figuring out who they are. I don't know much about what that era was actually like over there, but going by what the film shows, being gay back then meant dealing with a ton of hostility, and even just being suspected of it was enough to get you targeted. Think about what high school would've been like under those conditions. On top of that, the movie also digs into that thing where gay people end up turning that hatred inward on themselves for reasons that make no sense. It's a small, tender kind of film.

The story centers on Gyeong Hwan, a freshman who's just switched schools after moving to a new area. He ends up seated next to Jae Min, the class president, and the two hit it off once they realize they both love the same Japanese music. Because Gyeong Hwan comes across as shy and soft spoken, he becomes a bit of a target for bullies. As their bond deepens, Jae Min starts quietly showing him the ropes at the new school, and that opens him up to Gyeong Hwan in return. Somewhere along the way Gyeong Hwan falls for Jae Min without it being mutual, and he ends up admitting that his bullying at his old school happened because he liked another guy and is gay. That confession changes everything, Jae Min pulls away and turns cold, and not long after, whispers about Gyeong Hwan's sexuality spread through the school, cranking the bullying up several notches. Even the teachers show their own bias, and it starts dragging his grades down with it. Through all of it, his feelings for Jae Min never go away even though nothing comes back. At one point Jae Min steps in and pulls him out of a beating from other students, but he still barely says a word about it, and soon after that Gyeong Hwan leaves town. Jump to the present, and he stumbles on a CD Jae Min once gave him, only to discover it contains a hidden confession pointing to a website that, twenty years on, just returns a 404 error. It's a romance that never got the ending it deserved.

The two main guys don't end up together, but there's still a kind of happy ending buried in there, since Gyeong Hwan winds up with a partner and even has his mom's support behind him. So things did turn out okay for him eventually, sexuality and all. What the film really does well is capture how bad things were back then, and honestly how some of that hasn't fully gone away either, and that's the part that actually stings. Early on it plays out like a standard school drama, and you can tell Gyeong Hwan is catching feelings for Jae Min, and honestly Jae Min seems to feel something too, since every time someone asks why he keeps helping Gyeong Hwan, his answer is just, because it's you. Their small moments together are honestly adorable, especially the bits where they're just sitting around listening to music. Both actors bring their A game here. The guy playing Gyeong Hwan nails that awkward, timid teenager energy, and he sells the emotional pain so well it feels like it's coming from somewhere real inside him. Jae Min's actor brings his own kind of charm to the role too. All in all, this landed for me as a tender, low key, quietly sad story about young one sided love done really well. (6.5/10)