experiencing life in other people's shoes -- or bodies!
Synopsis
In Japan, a boy in the city randomly switches bodies with a girl in the country, forcing them to communicate via messages and notes left for one another.
Where'd I watch it?
It's available for rent on Amazon Prime.
What did I think?
Here's the top 10 highest-grossing Japanese films according to Wikipedia:
Okay, I did it. I finally watched "Your Name," which is one of the highest grossing anime movies of all time. This is amazing spectacle that CoMix Wave Films made before "Weathering With You."
It's a standard body-switch/Freaky Friday type movie that shows people different roles and worlds, instead of just different roles. The two characters are from very different parts of Japan and aren't a mother-daughter duo.
YOUR NAME was instantly strange because it opens and has a couple other musical interludes that made me feel like I was starting a series or coming to the end of a cliff-hanger episode. The best way to describe it is that the pacing sometimes felt a little off, even more than a little sometimes.
Now visually the film was amazing. As one can expect from most anime movies, the animation and colors and style was amazing. From cityscapes of Tokyo, to the Japanese countryside, shrines, trains, lakes, cafes, etc. One of the funny sensations about a lot of anime films is that they're like the perfect postcard for Japan, it's culture, its history, and anime movies are a good gateway to the anime world as a whole since they're not as long as series.
It's funny that I mention that, because I kept getting the feeling that YOUR NAME might've played better as a TV series rather than a movie. It feels like a lot gets crammed into the movie but I think that's because some scenes are really long and a lot of important developments are minimized into montages.
This goes back to the overall pacing of the movie, which reminded me of A SILENT VOICE. They try to throw the audience straight into the conflict but it lacked a lead-in or a thematically establishing shot or scene.
While the movie was good and I was impressed with the animation throughout the entire movie, I was shocked to not experience any of the emotional heart-tugs that A SILENT VOICE or WEATHERING WITH YOU accomplished. Visually and musically, the movie's far superior to A SILENT VOICE but character and story-wise it was a bit lacking and I never felt the sense of urgency that I did while watching WEATHERING WITH YOU. Without spoiling too much, there's a major twist in YOUR NAME that they don't properly execute. They mention it haphazardly, set it aside for a few sequences, and then try to rev it back up when it's brought to the forefront of the present action. I feel like most twists usually kick-off a hyper-mode or type of overtime when it comes to stories.
It's a very beautiful film but I'm surprised it's rated higher than HOWL'S MOVING CASTLE, PRINCESS MONONOKE, or WEATHERING WITH YOU -- but I'm a bit skeptical of Wikipedia's list of highest-grossing Japanese films because I don't see AKIRA on there.
But goddamn is it a striking spectacle of a movie. They do some really cool stuff with the colors there. Something in how they showed the countryside of Japan, almost gave it a distant fantasy-genre feel.
It's also a really cute movie and I remember chuckling to myself more than a few times.
FINAL GRADE?
I also feel like I might need to correct my rating for A SILENT VOICE since that movie actually punched me in the heart at the end, in a way that YOUR NAME did not.
Maybe A SILENT VOICE is actually a B- movie instead of a C+ one.
If you're interested in more reviews, here's a list of other movies I've written about:
Movie Review for 2020's "The Night House"
Movie Review for 2021's "Hellbender"
Movie Review for 2022's "Chainsaw Massacre"
Movie Review for 2014's "Mama"
Movie Review for 2021's "Cursed"
Movie Review for 2021's "Master"
Movie Review for 2022's "The Batman"
Movie Review for 2021's "Stillwater"
Movie Review for 2021's "Blue Bayou"
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