Forum - View topicREVIEW: Suzume no Tojimari
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ErikaD.D
Posts: 660 |
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Typical Makoto Shinkai movies ever since Your Name: natural disasters, beautiful animations, RADWIMPS and dead moms.
So it's basically Your Name 3 with same general plot structure and same troupes like dead mom cliche, which Shinkai keeps using it since Your Name (Mitsuha and possibly Taki) and Weathering with You (Hina and Hodoka's boss' daughter), that's one of the things I even dislike Shinkai's movies. Unpopular opinion but I think his newer movies are more repetitive than older movies because of the same plot and same cliches that I mentioned, thus it kills my hype. Won't be surprised if Shinkai re-uses the same plot and same cliches in his newer movie of another 3 years -- Your Name 4. |
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Philville
 Posts: 158 |
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Great review. (Note possible typo: "Yet, no sooner is the door closed then things get worse", "then" should be "than").
I can't wait to watch this on the biggest screen possible. |
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MagicPolly
 Posts: 1623 |
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I'm really wondering how I'll end up enjoying this, being one of the seemingly few people who genuinely enjoyed Weathering With You and also Children Who Chase.
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thepepin
Posts: 69 |
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Mainstream shonen aside, in anime villain often != antagonist. And "wise ancient supernatural trickster spirit with ambiguous motives" are the types least likely to be villains. Take "the mask seller" (also a cat, more or less) in A Whisker Away: while he wasn't exactly upfront in the beginning, ultimately everything that happened to Miyo was the result of her own choices and decisions. Also, Takai was DEFINITELY an antagonist in "Weathering With You." Difficult to call him a "villain" as he was a policeman enforcing actual laws with no evidence of him being corrupt or even partial, but at the very least Takai raises some "follow the law or do what is right" ethical questions. |
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thepepin
Posts: 69 |
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Ah, I forgot that he did Children Who Chase Lost Voices. (I associate that with Mamoru Hosada for some reason.) I loved Children Who Chase Lost Voices and even more so Your Name (though not as much as my favorite of his: The Place Promised In Our Early Days. But didn't like Weathering With You, to the point where I didn't even finish it. I don't necessarily agree with people who say that "all Shinkai's movies are the same." Children Who Chase Lost Voices was extremely dark and didn't exactly have a happy ending. And even though the "supernatural high school girl in shorts" was the character most featured in marketing materials for obvious reasons, the male lead was actually the main character. Also, while I haven't seen "The Garden of Words" or "5 Centimeters Per Second", those are very different from his most popular works also. |
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mbanu
 Posts: 160 |
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I'm a fan of a director using the same plot again and again remixing it subtly each time; it draws attention to the anime tradition of re-using certain themes, settings, and characters, and makes people (hopefully) question their assumptions about what makes movies good.
For some folks suspense and uncertainty are the best, I guess, while for others, it is just another form of stress. I mean, if people always loved suspense, visits to the doctor would be the most entertaining thing in the world. 
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Suzume22
Posts: 1 |
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Not sure I agree with the review caption on the front page: "Beautifully animated, emotionally resonate, and adeptly scored, Suzume no Tojimari's primary flaw is it feels too similar to Shinkai's previous works, your name. and Weathering With You" -- leading with this almost makes it sound like Suzume is a bad film.
While it seems that Suzume has the same type of three-act structure utilized in Your Name, I don't necessarily believe this is a problem. Your Name was a very unique film. It was initially billed as a quirky romantic comedy and all the twists were kept under wraps; in contrast, it looks like Shinkai hasn't hidden the general plot progression this time around (according to the trailers). I can recall some excellent Miyazaki films in which I can predict where the story will go (Howl's Moving Castle, Spirited Away, Castle in the Sky, etc.) and it does nothing to diminish these works of art. I wonder if this criticism is a bit harsh. Regarding the one bad CG moment, perhaps that's something that can be fixed for the blu-ray release? Otherwise, excellent review! Sounds like Suzume was a thoroughly extraordinary experience. As someone who loved Your Name (but not Weathering With You), I am incredibly excited to see this one. I'm also very pleased that Suzume currently has the highest ANN review rating for a Shinkai work -- I fully expect it to be the one to overtake Your Name as my favorite anime film! |
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SaitoHajime101
 Posts: 285 |
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I've been following Shinkai's works since watching 5cm back in the mid-00s and I have to say he's definitely grown as a storyteller. I remember buying 5cm on DVD then and one of the marketing taglines had him as the next Miyazaki. I am unsure if that sentiment is still there (if it ever was). I find those two to be wholly different types of storytellers.
I'm excited to see Suzume when it becomes available in North America. I consider Places Promised in Our Early Days has his best thus far, but 5cm is my personal favorite. Your Name holds up in the top 3 of his best. Hopefully Suzume will also break into the top 3. |
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kotomikun
Posts: 1205 |
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The showing I went to accidentally played the dub instead of the sub, which was a little distracting even though there's nothing wrong with the dub in and of itself. So, can't say yet where I'd rank this one, but it's at least in the ballpark of the previous two films. At least now I can read the review without getting spoiler'd!
I'm surprised to see it being called "predictable," because while Your Name, Weathering, and this one do all involve two lovebirds getting caught up in and separated by immense cosmic forces of destruction, the way it plays out is very different in each. Essentially, the first one is boy saves girl by preventing (or sort of diverting) the catastrophe, the second girl gets sort of forcibly sacrificed to prevent the catastrophe and boy saves her even though it allows the bad stuff to happen (causing some controversy among viewers), and the third is even more complicated. spoiler[Girl opens Pandora's Box, eventually leading to her being forced to sacrifice boy to prevent disaster, then going off to rescue him, intending to take his place as the sacrifice, but instead the weird cat-thing we thought was the antagonist retakes its place as the evil-sealing device, coming full circle just as she discovers her own life and the magic chair the boy got turned into are part of a time-loop.] Each one is iterating on the previous one's ideas, making them seem like predictable rehashes at first, but not by the end, or even the halfway point. I feel like he may go in a different direction after this "trilogy," though, if only because the concept to build upon is getting too cumbersome (I was surprised this was an over-2-hour movie). Above all else, I'm proud of him for finally figuring out how to write a strong female protagonist. Also, see if you can spot the easter-egg reference to Lost Voices (not counting the tiny supernatural cat). |
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Key
Moderator
 Posts: 18426 Location: Indianapolis, IN (formerly Mimiho Valley) |
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I saw the movie in theater last night and definitely missed this. Can you comment on it in spoiler tags? As for other matters, while this one does have elements in it from Shinkai's previous two films, classifying it as just "Your Name 3" is wholly inaccurate. Suzume has a very similar feel to most of Shinkai's previous works and uses some similar themes (especially making connections across time/space/dimensions and longing for things that are lost/out of reach), but I felt Shinkai successfully put fresher, interesting spins on those themes. There are also some newer elements worked in that I found quite satisfying, especially the part about Suzume's strained relationship with her aunt; I can easily see the aunt being a quite sympathetic character to anyone who has teenage or older children. Anyway, I was plenty well satisfied enough with the movie - and found it genuinely emotional enough at key points - that I fully agree with the review grades and will snap up the Blu-Ray for it as soon as it's available. |
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ScruffyKiwi
 Posts: 707 Location: New Zealand |
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I saw it yesterday and really enjoyed it. Add me in for a vote of not finding it predicable. One thing that stood out to me was that for a movie dealing with grief and loss it was actually really funny in parts! Loved it. Definitely one of his better movies.
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kotomikun
Posts: 1205 |
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spoiler[Near the end, when Suzume digs up a box with her diary in it, the outside of the box (or maybe the diary cover?) says "Agartha," the name of the parallel-universe realm in Lost Voices. Not a random reference, either, since like the "ever-after," it's sort of a weird afterlife-zone that living people aren't supposed to enter, with a similar starry background.] |
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DerekL1963
 Subscriber Posts: 1120 Location: Puget Sound |
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Agreed. It's not your name 3, more Your Name V3.0... If that makes sense. It's not a sequel or a remake, it's building on and extending the same ideas, elements, and themes. |
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whiskeyii
 Posts: 2267 |
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Eh, I liked it all the way up til about the third act. For my money, I think Belle is a much stronger, more cohesive story about grief and trauma as a major theme. Suzume seemed to be mostly about romantic love with a dash of resolving trauma at the end simply to resolve a spoiler[time loop.] The folks I went with also agree that this is the weakest of Shinkai’s relationships we’ve seen so far, simply because of how little time the two spend actually bonding onscreen. Suzume being into Souta we could all buy, but the reverse definitely needed more work—for all my gripes about Weathering With You’s ending, that movie was smart enough to have its romantic leads interacting together and often.
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Key
Moderator
Posts: 18426 Location: Indianapolis, IN (formerly Mimiho Valley) |
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It does make sense, although some of the themes (especially the one about making connections across space/time/dimensions) are practically universal to all Shinkai works |
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