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Forum - View topicREVIEW: 5 Centimeters Per Second DVD
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Egret
Posts: 45 |
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I really thought that the ending had a lovely touch of reality to it. As sad as it is that spoiler[Takaki and Akari never reunite, their childhood promise was, in a sense, fulfilled. They met one last time while the cherry blossoms fell. Now, perhaps, Takaki can move onward with his life].
We may not all have a childhood love in our pasts, but I think everybody has a lost connection somewhere along the line--an old friend, a summer-camp buddy, a might-have-been, or the like. Takaki's story could happen to anybody and is happening all around us every day. I really liked the sense that everyone has a story, and even if those stories don't have giant robots, ninjas, explosions, or angel wings, they still have weight and meaning. |
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Megiddo
 Posts: 8360 Location: IL |
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I think I might have liked 5 cm/s better if they actually showed the conflict/break up between Takaki and Akari. I know that it happened over a period of years, but I can't accept that Takaki just stops e-mailing/calling Akari, or vice versa. To me it seemed to skip from that awkward long-distance relationship to a shattered one, without really ever explaining much of anything.
Though, I might have just missed it while watching. Still, that has to be my biggest gripe about 5 cm. Oh, and I agree with the reviewer that Hoshi no Koe (Voices) is still Shinkai's best work. |
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daedelus
 Posts: 743 Location: Texas City, TX (ajd: 6/11/05) |
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It's really hard to put my finger on why Shinkai's works move me so much. I'm sure that a big part is the beautiful visuals in concert with the music. Then there's the story. Just like with Voices & Place Promised, after I finished 5cm, it took a few minutes for the story to completely sink in and hit me like a ton of bricks... in a good way.
It's interesting though that I got a different interpretation of the ending. One of hope. Could it be that I'm a hopeless romantic? Is the ending such that it is open to multiple interpretations? What Egret said in his/her post above about the fulfilled promise has me wondering if I missed something. If you reply, either PM me or be sure to spoiler tag it for the sake of others. 
I consider all three to be masterpieces. Because Voices of a Distant Star was the first one I saw, it will always hold an extra special place in my heart. |
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RMC
 Posts: 101 Location: Waco, TX |
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5 Centimeters Per Second has so many things going well for it. Visually it's very pleasing, the music is good, the storyline is believable, etc.
I feel the same way. I sat here after you said that and thought about it for a minute, then realized that there were a few things that really made it wonderful to me personally.
Or maybe I'm just nuts. All the same, I loved it. I totally agree with what you said.
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Paludis
Posts: 46 |
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any word on whether ADV will be releasing this on blu-ray? This is one movie that would really benefit from an HD release.
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Veoryn87
 Posts: 808 |
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I always found Mokoto Shinkai's movies to me more artistic marvels than animation marvels. I mean, look at the background art! I haven't seen anything like it. Maybe Ghibli, but Mokoto's movies have a more photo-realistic look to them.
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Serge
 Posts: 162 |
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That's true, but I can't even find this DVD in Stores at all, it's like, Rare, is ADV distributing this even? |
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W-General
Posts: 280 Location: Ithaca, NY, USA / Taichung, Taiwan |
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Oh all three (or 4) of Shinkai's works, I probably like this one the most.
While I have not had such experiences, so I cannot so I can relate to it, the message still feels very powerful. Despite its short length, I really liked part 3 the most. I think the ending is what it is: "Moving on." And I think Takaki has indeed moved on by his look at the end. I am somewhat disappointed with the flimsy packaging though. No limited edition release, ADV? I know they're in a stick right now, but if you look at the Japanese limited edition release (3 disc set!) (http://www.amazon.co.jp/秒速5センチメートル-特別限定生産版-DVD-BOX-水橋研二/dp/B000MQCT1U/ref=sr_1_4?ie=UTF8&s=dvd&qid=1206975024&sr=8-4), the ADV release pales in comparison... Love how "One More Time, One More Chance" is synced with the video though, absolutely beautiful and poignant. |
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dormcat
Encyclopedia Editor
 Posts: 9902 Location: New Taipei City, Taiwan, ROC |
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BD edition is coming out in less than three weeks, and I bet most collectors would choose to buy that one instead, since Japan and US share the same region code (A). Personally I'm content with my 2-disc R3TW limited edition (without the CD single) for now, as I don't have budget for a HDMI-ready full-HD LCD monitor + a BD player yet. 
I wonder who would buy the HD-DVD edition now... |
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Fronzel
Posts: 1906 |
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I liked parts 1 and 2, and I appreciate that Shinkai has refrained the sci-fi elements found in Voices and The Place Promised that arguably distract from the main story, but part 3’s pacing was so wonky I thought it screwed up the whole narrative. Parts 1 and 2 are very slowly paced, but we’re hit with an avalanche of changes as soon as part 3 starts…it even uses a montage to get through things as quickly as possible. This is especially startling given that part 2 only held a single piece of development for the overall plot. The transition was so disorienting that I didn’t even realize at first that spoiler[it had been years since the two had spoken as of part 3], which made things very jarring.
What makes this worse is that the whole thing's only an hour, so it's not like they were pressed to fit things into a reasonable running-time. If part 3 had been a bit longer, it could have done things better.
spoiler[Didn't you notice that Akari is marrying someone else? Not to mention that she didn't wait for the trains to pass in the very last scene.] |
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ANN_Bamboo
ANN Contributor
 Posts: 3904 Location: CO |
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There was no conflict/break-up, though, so they couldn't have shown it. The two just simply eventually drifted apart. And, although spoiler[Akari eventually moved on, Takaki never did. She gets married, while Takaki can't seem to really make things work with his girlfriend, because she thinks he's forever distant.] So, more than anything, it's almost a one-sided loneliness, I think. But that's the way life works out sometimes, and I think that kind of heartache and loneliness is something that Shinkai is so good at portraying. |
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Goodpenguin
Posts: 457 Location: Hunt Valley, MD |
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To me there's a tugging duality in (my personal) opinion on this movie, and it's sort of typified in looking at the title itself. At a glance '5 Centimeters Per Second' can seem a simple, affecting title/phrase, and yet it can also seem a little '10th Grade literature class' earnest-cum-hokey as well. That's sort of the dichotomy I run into thinking about this movie; on one hand it employs a pacing/storytelling style far in emotional advance of most anime efforts, yet on the other this seems something that strikes one as much more effective at 19/20 then 29/30. That's certainly no sin, but I don't know if one can say Makoto Shinkai's mastered that 'all ages' poignancy you see in the best of Miyazaki's work (as he was compared in several articles), or tales like 'Ratatouille'. There's some touching material here, but in fairness the entire 'young love-adolescent drift-young adult wandering' story model is a well-worn construct, and for the story's beauty there are times where the material seems to be running in familiar story-telling 'grooves' rather then generating a unique 'gravity' of it's own. This is kind of a tough nut to peg definitively one way or another, but it's certainly worth a look.
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danshyu
Posts: 7 |
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Personally, I'll skip this DVD for now and wait for Blue-ray.
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Mohawk52
 Posts: 8202 Location: England, UK |
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HellKorn
Posts: 1669 Location: Columbus, OH |
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Art only an A-? Really? It's an aesthetic, sure, but for pure eye candy this far and away Shinkai's best effort to date. The backgrounds themselves go beyond the hyper-real dimension in Place Promised and become something entirely else because of the art direction. The characters themselves -- while awkwardly animated in parts, but that's for animation, not art -- also are more comfortably formed compared to the "pointedness" of Voices. I'm not quite as fond of some other aspects of the production (more on that in a sec.), and there are plenty of other anime that I find more visually appealing, but I can't think of any other anime work that I'd call more "beautiful."
Shinkai has always been progressing more as a storytelling; Voices is a purely emotional (to some, maybe an "emoporn") experience, but doesn't give sufficient context or depth. Place Promised corrects those issues while having the same beauty as Voices, even if it is hampered down by its technical jargon. I would say that 5 Cm is his best yet... if it weren't for the ending. I basically agree with Fronzel in regards to the finale. Now, I don't have a problem with the content itself, but the execution. (This is spoiling anything, but considering how anal some can be, I'm putting this in tags.) spoiler[The whole thing is a montage that reminds me of a music video. It loses impact because it's no longer ambiguous but just lazily throwing together images that you'd have to pause to catch to full piece together what happened between Takari and Akari.] That the third segment is also apparently the longest in the novelization is rather telling that a lot is cut from this, and makes the ending feel more haphazard. And I can't stand the song. I don't care that it fits lyrically, but it just does not fit with the score that Tenmon sets for the movie, and I really can't stand to listen to it.
With different outcomes, tho'. Voices is ambiguous to the fate of the pair; Placed Promised is more decidedly optimistic; 5cm has a tint of hope -- not the right word, but nothing else comes to mind -- amidst a relationship that isn't meant to be.
Wasn't Shinkai frequently away from his wife when he was in the gaming industry? Thought that I saw something like that some time ago. |
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