How a single actress carried my obsession for the cdrama world. Happy birthday, Reba!
A small prologue before I get to the main point: This is the experience of an inter fan that came a few months ago in the world of cdramas. Cdramas always carry the aura of otherworldliness to me when comparing them to kdramas, tdramas, and even anime. So when I watch cdramas, I want to emerge myself into the mythos or the fairytale.
Now, I never thought that otherworldliness could be found in anything other than the plot, or else I wouldn't be writing this today. This otherworldliness I found in Dilraba Dilmurat.
There's not much I can say about the beauty of the most beautiful actress in the world that has already been told. For me, Dilraba's beauty doesn't lie only on her looks but also her behavior. Surely, she does have the face card to turn every photoshoot of hers into an art gallery, but it's her energy that enhances the meaning behind those photos. There are many beautiful actresses out there that have incredible photoshoots, but I find Dilraba's to be uniquely artistic. For me, Dilraba is the prime example of what aesthetic elegance and grace truly feel like. Every angle is her good angle, seriously and every picture holds a part of her soul. Continuing on to her works to explain in more detail what I mean.
Dilraba brings the energy of the main lead effortlessly, hence, her dramas always hold me on chokehold. She's simply captivating in every role to the point I would start a drama whose genre I don't even like if she played in it. My view on Dilraba's roles before I watched my first drama of hers was that she was always the cold, badass female lead. My surprise was immense when I came to watch Eternal Love. I never thought that this aesthetic goddess rose from playing the cute, naive roles. So, I started wondering why she stuck to me so much, especially after watching my first drama of hers (Love on the Turquoise land).
Well, it's the eyes.
No, no, hear me out. I won't settle for the fact that she has some of the most captivating eyes in the world. It's the way she conveys messages with her eyes. I can literally watch a drama focused only on her eyes and follow the scene without even zooming out. It's the subtlety. The silent fury, the silent frustration, the silent relief, the silent love. Every emotion is lower-case until the story hits the climax. Then, as if she flips a switch, her eyes contain all those emotions amplified immensely. The consistency and emotional range of her simple stare is a superpower at this point. The blue whisper's director knew the power in Dilraba's stare, and so we have so many close-up zooms to her eyes alone (I cannot thank that person enough because it was in that series that my question was finally answered). It's literally an achievement through hard work and pure talent to be able to express yourself from the eyes alone. But she didn't settle for that, and my respect for her rose at this point. Where there is art, there is always space for improvement.
She developed her craft even beyond that. She makes cute scenes feel less cringe, she makes sad scenes feel heartwretching, she makes love scenes powerful, and all of that by using body language to enhance the emotion that her face has already displayed. This might seem like a basic skill that actors should have owned, but when it comes to idol dramas, I've seen actors and actresses feel "wooden" because of the inconsistency between face and body language. Not every idol starts from acting after all. Even at the beginning of her career, there were moments she also had fallen to that trap, but with time and effort, she surpassed that. No one is born perfect, the willingness to improve is what we should be praising.
I could see this as I watched the King's woman and then jumped to Love beyond the grave. The evolution of her acting is right there. She knows what the camera wants, and she delivers it efficiently.
I do not know much about Dilraba herself because I have not met her in person. From what she shows on-camera (including interviews and BTS), she's a humble, hardworking person who is not afraid to fight for what she believes in. She cares for her work with diligence. She stays simple but doesn't fear going overboard if the situation requires it. I can see why the haters are always searching for a flaw or wait for her to trip. The bigger the light, the bigger the shadow chasing it. She's also funny and intelligent from what I've heard from her fans and seen in clips, so I'm looking forward to watching The Truth because of that.
To conclude, I hope that this small essay can show how I feel for the phenomenon called Dilraba Dilmurat, although I find myself in lack of inadequate vocabulary to truly express my admiration so I will settle for this for now.
For those who reached this point of the post, I salute and thank you for reading all this, and if by any chance this reaches Reba's feed this goes for her: I wish you happy 34th birthday and that this year brings you joy, prosperity and everything you wish for! Your photoshoots and dramas heals my artist's block, so this appreciation post is my birthday gift for you. ♥️
A random interfan
P.S: The photos I've added are some of my favorite photoshoots of hers (the pictures are mainly from pinterest)