The highly anticipated “Weathering With You” has been released across Japan on 18-July.
Shinkai Makoto’s previous “Your Name” deserved the artistical acclaim and the massive commercial success, but this another masterpiece does live up to and even exceed the elevated expectations. This post is by no means meant to spoil the joy of apprecieating latest Shinkai’s artwork, but to raise the expectations further by providing spoiler-free impressions (though any advance information could become a noisy preconception).
Overall impressions:
- Life-affirming theme eminates across the movie and we (audience) could easily feel (if not “measure”) the enormity of the energy put into the movie to get across the theme to us.
- As each of us more or less gets lost in life, and however our struggles may be, we could find some hope and solace in the movie .
- As with previous Shinkai’s works, the subtlety of characters’ (as well as our) emotions and gestures are minutely depicted. The vivid reflection of reality is also instrumental to leading us to believe the extraordinary world (fictional side) of the movie.
- The movie is covered with various covert references to the subsequent plots (as well as previous movie characters), but they are not distracting and the audience could be glued to follow the arresting plot.
- Granted our lives are not as dramatic as this movie, but the various bits of nonchalant interactions and depictions makes us giggle and relate to.
“Pilgrimage” (for those living at/visiting to Tokyo) :
- In the Japanese sub-culture context, the term for “pilgrimage” (聖地巡礼) is also used to refer to visiting the actual locations that are featured in Anime/Movie etc. “Weathering With You” features many Tokyo locations and those are (for those familiar with the locations) easily identifiable.
- If you live in/visit to Japan and have a chance to watch this movie in Japan (and capable of understanding Japanese without subtitles: important!), I would highly recommend you to watch the movie at “Ikebukuro Humax Cinema” as there is a critical scene that takes place right in front the theater (I happened to watch the movie in the abovementioned theater, and I was overly euphoric)
- Aside from Ikebukuro, Shinjuku, Yoyogi and Tabata appears as some of the noticeable/key scenes.
Music:
- I have nothing much to add other than: RADWIMPS is as rad as they are for “Your Name”. Any amount of compliment would do the justice for their contribution to the movie.
End Credit:
- It was noticeable that there are many non-Japanese names in the end credit (especially compared to previous anime movies). As good creative works shall be shared to a greater audience and also inspire further great works, the export of anime culture is welcome trend that I wish to continue to see.
- These was a tragic arson/murdering case targeted to Kyoto Animation in the same week of “Weathering With You” release. However utopian it may seem, artworks shall drive positive changes only and not the contrary ones.
Climate/Weather:
- Tokyo (as well as the rest of Japan) had exceptionall rainy weather during Jun. – July 2019, which coincidentally mirrored the setting laid out in the movie.
- The movie seems to raise an issue to the current global climate change and seems to encourage the audience to think and adapt in the context of current climate change.
Searching for Trademarks/Characters from previous movies:
- There are multiple conspicuous (and less noticeable) appearances of characters from “Your Name”. The 2 are obviouse, but some other characters seem to be hidden in the movie (according the the end credit).
- As a predominant practice in Japan, wives (rather than husbands, which is not non-existent, but rare) change their last name to the other spouse’s name. Having this practice in mind, we could develop wild conjectures about how Taki and Mitsuha evolved after the last scene of “Your Name”
- Similarly, major trademarks/products, such as instant noodles, are scattered in the movie.
Maturity of Characters (particularly Juvenile ones):
- As Japanese culture is accentuated with high-context culture (tacit protocols/rule are assumed in communication), there are many depictions of non-verbal gestures that are well intended (but not obvious). Particularly, the maturity of young characters stand out in these small gestures and those are adding colorfulness of the movie.
Shinkai and the all creators involved managed to create another masterpice that provides us with a superb entertainment and forward-looking hopes for our life.
Snapshots (taken after 5-30 minutes after the watching of the movie) of locations appeared in the movie at Ikebukuro ：
