[Movie Review] Hoshi o Ou Kodomo - 8.2/10
aka: Children Who Chase Lost Voices from Deep Below
Recommendation: Even if you aren't normally a fan of Shinkai, watch it. Actually, especially if you aren't normally a fan.
I said I'd do this soon didn't I? Soon is like, a week. Shut up. I'm a single guy looking for jobs, which is in itself a full time job. You get back from a day of job hunting and then sitting down and writing something that takes thought can be a bit daunting. Anyway, first thing you should know before I start on this review is that I'm a huge Makoto Shinkai fanboy (director famous for 5 centimeters per second, Voice of a Distant Star and She and Her Cat). You should have seen my MySpace when that was still relevant. I'm talking hugely decked out with Makoto Shinkai colors, images, and quotes and Tenmon music. 5 centimeters per second has been a sanctified favorite of mine for some time. What this should tell you is that when I heard about his new work some two or three years ago, I was ecstatic. I'm not usually one to hype things, but I do like to hype things I'm sure are safe, because when the hype is rewarded, the impact is that much more. Much like when I was waiting for Clannad: After Story or Aria the Originiation, I was sure this was a safe one to hype. You can imagine where this is going.
Boy was I wrong. Not to say this film was bad, it's just not as Earth shatteringly amazing as I expected (Read: BAAAAWWWW IT'S NOT 5cm/s BAAAWWW).
tl;dr - smaller review in the Anime Forum
Plot: I knew this wasn't going to be his usual sort of film when I heard it was going to be an adventure. The story follows Asuna, a clearly Ghibli inspired young, strong and independent female lead who lives effectively on her own in a small countryside town. Her single mother is constantly working, so she's clearly been forced to fend for herself. After school Asuna often travels to her favorite vista just outside of town, where she sits and messes around with her makeshift crystal radio. One night gazing out of her kitchen window she spots a strange light shimmering from that very outcropping. When she sets out the next day to investigate, she is attacked by a strange beast, and just as abruptly rescued and whisked away by a young boy in strange clothing. It isn't long before this chance encounter sweeps her (and her mysterious substitute teacher with clear ulterior motives) away to the mythical land of Agartha, a veritable wonderland of beautiful landscapes, strange creatures, demons and even Gods. This story is clearly derivative, but it's done in a way that is sufficiently new that you won't get bored. It spends far too much time (half the film) setting up the story. It's not hard to figure out why Shinkai chose to do this, but at the same time it could have been shorter and dragged on a lot less with the same results. Pacing in general was a problem. It seemed like we moved through stages in a video game at times. As if we were stumbling from one arena to the next. It made for an awkward viewing experience and was harmful to my overall immersion in the plot. I found myself distracted despite having the show full screened. It also just doesn't seem as downright inspired as Shinkai normally is. It probably comes down in part to him wanting to get away from what he knows, and not really being all that comfortable with it. There were several moments where a theme was introduced, and then promptly forgotten, as if Shinkai didn't really know where to go with it. As much as it hurts to admit, the result of this hesitation is a thematically shallow plot. It stops this film from being one of deep literary interest, and leaves it at "really good adventure film." I give the plot an 7/10.
Characters: This is a Ghibli story alright. Young girl with a strong personality? Check. Young prince male lead? Check. We've got ourselves and adventure fantasy. If you're a Ghibli fan, you'll like this film. Shinkai doesn't disappoint-- as a Ghibli fanboy himself, he knows how to do it right. No problems there. Shinkai does manage to add his personal flare to it as well, and fans of his work will notice this. The characters in this movie were fantastically done. First we have Asuna, who I've described in an almost Mary Sue-ish fashion. But she's not. She's much more complex than that and I'd ruin the climax if I went too much into it. Still I want to talk about her development because it's different from the usual Shinkai. In most of his films, we get a lot of internal monologueing to give us complete understanding of what the character is thinking. This time around Shinkai takes a different approach, and instead uses the body language and behavior of his characters to reveal what they are thinking. We don't get to know what they're thinking unless they say it. This is particularly the case with Asuna. We're left to wonder why she tags along with her bereaved substitute teacher, despite clear danger. Unlike her teacher, she has no clear motivation other than kindness or some sense of adventure. But if you're keen and analytical of her behavior, it's clear that it's not so simple. Dammit I need spoiler tags. Let's assume you know why she came to Agartha. Just watch how she constantly seeks to support her teacher, how she clings to Shun's younger brother so quickly, and most telling of all, in a flash back when she reacts to her dad's death. To me that latter example was the most telling and the most authentic moment in her characterization. The way she totally ignores and denies her father's death, almost pretending he's not gone at all, is just so incredibly real. It's the same way a lot of children cope with abrupt loss, and it of course plays an enormous part in her psyche throughout the film. The greatest realization I had was that all of my questions about her were questions she was also asking herself. She wasn't aware of why she needed to be in Agartha either. She had no idea what she was looking for. But the motivation was there all the same, and it was a journey for both the viewer and Asuna to find the answer to that. And when she does, you'd be pretty cold to not have a massive DAAAAAWWWW moment. It was a great moment.
Now for the teacher, Morisaki, who's also much more than meets the eye. He's set up as a sympathetic antagonist, but I'd hesitate to call him even that. Oh he's calculating and he'll do what it takes to attain his goals, but he's certainly not evil or even immoral. He's never anything less than human until he's literally tempted at his most vulnerable moment to forget his strict morality and empathetic nature. Even at his climactic decision moment, you can see he's been pushed to the brink to sacrifice his core values. He's a very openly wounded character, and that brings a lot to the table. First it means he's desperate and in dire need of someone to stop his pain. Second he's intensely aware of what it means to lose something. With his loss comes a certain degree of wisdom. This brings out a lot in Asuna, and he clearly becomes somewhat of a father figure to her. Through some unspoken mutual understanding, they become family. Like I said, he's never anything less than human, and whenever Shinkai shows us that he's a villain, he never forgets to at follow those moments up with something to keep us from turning him into one.
Poor Shin got a bit sidelined in all of this. He goes through a lot of development, but he hasn't got any of the depth. He's very much a Ghibli Prince who gets shown a better way by Asuna. Frankly, I just don't know what to say about him. His motives and struggles are straightforward. The one time I thought he was interesting was when he asked an Elder if perhaps those of Agartha had become to easily accepting of their own conventions and death. He brings up that really interesting theme, but then Shinkai completely neglects to explore it. Dammit that was a really solid ORIGINAL question Shinkai, and it should have been the central theme of the movie. Is it really okay to be so accepting of death? Agarthans are so quick to let people go and say "now they're a part of something bigger." When the wise man gets his daughter back, he's barely even excited, as if to say that should she had died he'd have understood it was her time. Shin questioned this kind of thinking, and then it was completely forgotten. Bad Shinkai. (10/10 for Characters)
Animation/Art: Needless to say this whole movie is an eyegasm. Agartha is absolutely beautiful (pictured above). Sprawling landscapes with just enough unearthly aspects to highlight how foreign it is. It's smooth and continuous. I actually think animation-wise, it's a step up from previous works of Shinkai. He's often criticized for making really pretty looking slideshows, but this had none of that. And he kept the really pretty cloud scapes, which, as a guy with enormous cloud envy, was much appreciated. I love me some cloud porn. Furthermore the fight scenes, which Shinkai rarely does, are exciting and well choreographed. They're also very fluid and human. Getting cut looks damn painful, and impacts the motion of the characters. I have nothing but praise for the animation. Artistically though, it's a couple of steps down. Not that his drawings aren't good; they're anything but. Those monster things? Genuinely creepy. Character designs? Very distinctive and varied. No complaints there. My gripe is again that BAW it's not 5cm/s. Every single frame of that film was full of meaning on a poetic level. Shots were composed to mirror and expand on events in the plot. There's a pivotal scene in 5cm/s where Kanae, a girl in love with the protagonist, is just about to confess, and at that moment the scheduled rocket launches into space, its smoke splitting the evening sky into separate canvases. At the same moment the protagonist has given Kanae a preemptive rejection before she's even said anything, and the rocket serves as the perfect imagery for the divide between the two. This was a commonplace element in 5cm/s. Nothing was repeated that didn't need to be, and a lot of things were said said via carefully placed images, be they in the background or on the faces of the characters, or in their cellphones. You had to pay attention. Hoshi o Ou Kodomo was nowhere near as polished. Sure there were a lot of meaningful scenes. There was one in particular that showed two dragonflies mating, only to be interrupted by the rain, foreshadowing Morisaki's developments. I like scenes like that. Mise en scene is an important element in film, and Shinkai knows how to do it. But this film is longer, and he got lazy. He just didn't do as much poetry and chose to do a lot more in blunt conventional ways. This brings me back to this being merely a "good adventure film" when it should have been a "Makoto Shinkai adventure film." (9/10
Sound: Okay Tenmon, you're turn. I'm not sure if it was you or Shinkai that decided to put emotional tracks every other scene, but music direction was way below par. Like the animation, there were some great tracks. I'm getting the soundtrack for sure. But when every other scene has that emotional track, the effect gets reduced, so when you really needed the music to be emotive, it was out of mojo. By the final scene I was desensitized, and what should have been a tremendous scene was a lot less potent. This was not in good combination with the already thematically weak plot, which really needed to hit me hard to make it's trite message worth hearing again. These flaws met with my overhype led cause a huge deflation for me. Not to mention "Hello Goodbye and Hello" is definitely no "One More Time, One More Chance." 5 cm/s left me dumbfounded and shocked with it's powerful and difficult-to-get-at message. With stunning animation throughout and the sudden burst into the ending song I was all the more speechless. It hit me like a truck and I immediately had to go back and watch it five more times. Hoshi o Ou Kodomo on the other hand left me with "Meh, that was nice" and the music direction is largely responsible. Again not that the tracks were bad. Music aside, the sound effects nothing to complain about. Nor was the voice acting. In fact I think all of the actors did a great job. Hisako Kanemoto (Asuna) did a really great job delivering the right sentimentality where it was necessary, and Kazuhiko Inoue's (Morisaki) performance was spectacular. Morisaki had some lines that needed to be delivered with a difficult cocktail of emotions and he didn't miss a note. I give music and sound an 8/10.
Enjoyment: A very entertaining film. It was kinda boring for about half the film, as I previously said, but once things got rolling it never stopped and I found myself pretty into it. My major issue was that I over-hyped this film so much that I was completely underwhelmed. There's not much else to say on the matter. I think most people will find that they'll enjoy this a lot more than I did. Actually having watched it a second time now I find I enjoyed it a lot more. Still, I give it a 7/10 here.
Overall: Despite its flaws, Hoshi o Ou Kodomo was a good film and it was worth the two hours for any anime fan. Expect stunning visuals and scenery, and a step up in complexity from your usual tripe. Just don't expect a masterpiece (which won't be a problem for you Shinkai haters). Averaging up my scores gives me an 8.2/10 overall.