Forum - View topicThe List - The Top 5 Makoto Shinkai Movies
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Angel M Cazares
 Posts: 5513 Location: Iscandar |
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I had never been a big Makoto Shinkai fan because I found his movies underwhelming and unnecessarily complicated, but The Garden of Words was a step in the right direction. Finally everything came together beautifully for him in the wonderful Your Name. I have yet to watch Weathering With You, but from what I have heard about it Shinkai may have reverted back to his former self; I hope that is not the case because he definitely has talent.
1. Your Name - A 2. The Garden of Words - B+ 3. Children Who Chase Lost Voices - B+ 4. 5 Centimeters Per Second - B 5. The Place Promised in Our Early Days - B- |
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tojikomori
 Posts: 71 Location: Minnesota |
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Just thinking about this list reminded me how much I love his collaborations with Tenmon; you made me to go and dig up the Voices of a Distant Star and Place Promised In Our Early Days soundtracks. Maybe it just wouldn't work as well now that Shinkai's writing style has moved away from those long VN-like monologues but the two seem such kindred spirits in their sentimentality. When Children Who Chase Lost Voices came out I took for granted that Shinkai & Tenmon would be a career-long pairing.
For all its imperfections I'd love to see Shinkai take on another film as creatively ambitious as Children Who Chase Lost Voices. I can understand why it's not in a list but other than 5cm/second it's the film of his that I found myself thinking the most about and needing to rewatch more than others. |
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Yuki_Kun45
Exempt from Grammar Rules
 Posts: 725 Location: U.S.A. |
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Thanks for listing Voices of a Distant Star, that movie is a great gem kind of being lost among his later features.
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Top Gun
 Posts: 4828 |
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I haven't seen Shinkai's past three works yet, but I'm not the hugest fan of the recurring theme that most of his films riff on. Call me unsentimental, but the whole "wistful, pining, distant unfulfilled love" setup doesn't do a whole lot for me personally. 5 cm/s left me feeling especially cold: the entire film boils down to "grown-ass man still can't get over his middle-school crush for some reason." I was also a fan of the girl featured in the middle segment of the film, and it was incredibly frustrating that she didn't so much as appear in the final segment. Children Who Chase Lost Voices was generally enjoyable, even if it was essentially Diet Ghibli, but oddly enough, I think my favorite of his works so far is the rarely-cited Place Promised. It's kind of a narrative mess, but it has a very satisfying conclusion. I think Weathering with You is playing in our local multiplex this week, but I haven't yet decided if I'll make an attempt to see it.
The thing that I will always give Shinkai is that his films are an absolute visual feast, and CoMix Wave's background work gets more and more incredible with every release. I think they're more than worth watching even on that level alone. |
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Megiddo
 Posts: 8360 Location: IL |
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Hoshi no Koe will likely always be my favorite Shinkai film likely due to its brevity and since the characters actually act like a young couple torn apart by time and space.
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Otaku-sempai
 Posts: 132 Location: Lackawanna, NY |
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"This one was Shinkai's most well-known work throughout the early 20th century"
I think you might have meant: the early 21st century. Unless Shinkai is a lot older than he looks. 
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Ggultra2764
 Subscriber Posts: 3976 Location: New York state. |
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I've yet to see Weathering With You, so won't comment on it. But as far as his films go, my reception to Shinkai's films have been hit-or-miss over the past couple decades as they essentially milk the same sort of premise in focusing on long-distance relationships in varying facets. They're great when he keeps things grounded and get underwhelming for me when he decides to milk a paranormal gimmick of some sort that causes things to get convoluted with their premises. But as far as what I'd consider as a Top 5 list for my favorite Shinkai films:
1. 5 Centimeters Per Second 2. Garden of Words 3. Voices of a Distant Star 4. She and Her Cat 5. Your Name |
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Lancelotginus
Posts: 16 |
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In general, I’m a fan of Shinkai’s work. I saw weathering today, and was pretty underwhelmed though. IMO most overrated is Garden of words, and personally I think place promised is undervalued.
1. Your Name 2. Place Promised 3. 5 Centimeters 4. Voices of a Distant Star 5. She and her cat |
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q_3
Posts: 173 |
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A Gathering of Cats is sorely underappreciated and makes me wish we got to see Shinkai branch out into more genres (or at least make more comedies).
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Key
Moderator
 Posts: 18494 Location: Indianapolis, IN (formerly Mimiho Valley) |
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While I still think Voices has the strongest and most compelling concept of any of his Shinkai's works (and I've always been impressed by the austere economy of its storytelling), I also absolutely agree that Your Name has to be #1 to its #2. It's just such a vastly more refined work in every sense and I have to agree with comments both here and in the most recent ANNcast about how it takes on stronger meaning when put in the context of the Fukushima disaster.
I also agree with the presence and ordering of the other three, and for pretty much the same reasons that Lynzee mentions. |
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Alestal
 Posts: 605 Location: Dallas, Texas |
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1. The Garden of Words
A great movie and the most mature of any of this directors works. 2. Children Who Chase Lost Voices (can't believe I missed this one when it was first released) This movie is beautifully done and very creative. It is enjoyable from start to finish. 3. 5 Centimeters Per Second Touching stories, a surprising ending, and a great soundtrack. What's not to love? 4. Weathering With You New to the list. This movie was a solid watch and had a lot of good humor. 5. Your Name This movie was pretty good. I don't think it was as wonderful as it's regarded, but I can respect that a lot of work went into the production. |
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Kamijou Touma
 Posts: 153 Location: Gakuen Toshi |
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1. Kimi no Na wa
2. Tenki no Ko 3. Kotonoha no Niwa 4. Byousoku 5 Centimeter 5. Kumo no Mukou, Yakusoku no Basho |
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Hiroki not Takuya
 Posts: 2687 |
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When the title is "The Top Five" I keep forgetting that it is idiosyncratic to the columnist and not a ranking based on a measure of the public at large. Otherwise, I can't fathom leaving out The Place Promised in any top five list of Shinkai works since it was his first major movie production (Voices of a Distant Star involved much fewer people) and relatively well received...
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kotomikun
Posts: 1205 |
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Technically that's what it is, but those 5 are exactly what you could expect to get from a popularity poll. All the ones people talk about the most, including the new one, and Your Name at #1. Personally, though, I never liked Distant Star or 5 Centimeters all that much. The former is impressive for being made by one person, but both of them are so overly melancholy that it was hard to feel invested in the characters. Children Who Chase Lost Voices was when his characters started to feel like real people (Place Promised was interesting conceptually but had the same flat-characterization issue of his earlier movies), so that's probably my "original" favorite. At the same time, I can't really argue with Your Name being number 1, unless Weathering takes its place (I've seen it, but these things take time to process). It's similar to Your Name in many ways, but also quite different. I can see this being a subject of endless disagreement among fans... |
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koinosuke
 Posts: 274 Location: Fukushima, Japan |
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Note to the author - Your Name is actually not the highest-grossing film in Japan, where Spirited Away remains at the top, beating out Your Name by more than ¥5 billion yen (around $46 million dollars). It also sits behind Titanic and Frozen at the Japanese box office. Where Your Name does reign victorious, however, is worldwide, where it is the highest-grossing Japanese film of all time -- just not in its native box office.
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