2007 in 12 day 6: The Girl Who Leapt Through Time
My shiny new RSS feed is working like a charm now (complete with added FEEDBURN), so subscribe, browse and enjoy. ^_^ Sadly my fansub reviewing is soon to grind to a frustrating and indefinite halt and I can’t work out exactly why. Halp plz. Back on-topic…
It wasn’t long ago that I was watching and reviewing this movie for the first time but, being a highlight of the year and being next up alphabetically, I’m revisiting it again in the name of the festive season. Actually, since Bandai have picked up the licence less than a fortnight ago, it is actually quite topical anyway. All I can say on the latter point is, good job Bandai. And for the rest of you…go grab it as soon as the DVD’s out and, in the case of stateside fans, catch it on the big screen too.
I’ve gone over why this movie is such a highpoint of the last twelve months (I know it came out last year but I only watched it recently…) in my review so I guess I ought to pick out the best bits of the film. It’s therefore going to be a shorter one so there’ll be none of that tl;dr nonsense, ok?
Memorable moments
The movie balanced drama and comedy superbly, so I will forever remember this feature as one that had me in turns entranced and chuckling uncontrollably all the way through. The characters, brought spectacularly to life by Sadamoto’s distinctive designs, are the heart of the story: I loved the way in which they interacted and bounced friendly jibes at one another in the more light-hearted scenes, then became absorbed in the more profound ones later on. The shyness, good-natured teasing and trivial conversations felt so natural on-screen I actually felt like I was watching a live-action or mockumentary type of film in between the more sci-fi orientated time leaps. If you imagine a Bill Murray comedy in the style of Takahata’s slice of life…in a cringe-worthy title-butchering pun I’d say this was Only Yester-Groundhog-Day. *winces*
Makoto was a great protagonist - she was selfless and selfish, thoughtful and irresponsible, and utterly ordinary…ironically that average-ness made her all the more memorable. What I found to be the most outstanding and refreshing was the way in which the time travel was handled - there were one or two trippy scenes depicting the travel itself but the consequences were the main focus and were rather unexpected. Take this for example: you discover, for the first time, that you are able to jump back in time to whenever you want. What do you do? Meet a famous historical figure? Explore a distant and little-known era of history? Not Makoto. She jumps back in time to swipe her favourite pudding from the fridge and help herself all over again. Twice. That, my friends, is knowing your priorities.
It always tastes better the second…or even third time around
It’s unexpected but makes sense really that your average teenager is going to use time travel to avoid awkward social situations and do better in class - that sort of thing is closer to a schoolgirl’s heart than meeting Julius Caesar or something. The way in which she kept jumping backwards to replay a certain day to get a sequence of events ‘just right’ or to prevent her best friend asking her out was funny but later on in the movie its significance became more thought-provoking and serious - this bittersweet sort of after-image effect summed up why the film was so extraordinary and special.
Other ABC bloggers’ posts for the Twelve Days of Christmas
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Posted on December 20th, 2007 @ 12:20 am
I missed hearing about this movie when it was out; the premise sounds really cute. I just might get it. ^^
Yay pudding.
Posted on December 20th, 2007 @ 8:43 pm
“Only Yester-Groundhog-Day”
You should be shot for that.
That aside, great review. Good point that one of the strengths of Makoto as a main character is that she’s perfectly ordinary - no grand ambitions or schemes to play the stock market and get rich, just small dreams and simple priorities. Although admittedly, who wouldn’t want to go back in time to eat more pudding, really?
I also fully agree about the dialogue - it feels perfectly natural and ordinary, thus reinforcing the setting of complete day to day normalcy. It makes a great contrast to all the sci-fi elements and serves to anchor the film in something familiar to counter the trippy time warping.
Edit: Also, I tried to post this yesterday just as your site went down. I had to keep the window open with the error page displayed all night long, waiting for your site to come back up so that I could hit refresh and not have to try and retype everything I said. ;P
Posted on December 20th, 2007 @ 11:36 pm
@Crisu: yay for pudding indeed!
@Orion: guilty as charged yer honour. I really loved the relaxed and confident way in which the whole thing flowed, mind - the director comes across as self-assured and knows what he’s doing so I’d wager he’s on course for more good things.
As for the downtime, my apologies. There were problems during the time I was posting my last ef review, which involved re-writing the second half. There doesn’t seem to be any problem now though - I’m quite fortunate in how rarely the server goes down. Cheers for your patience!
Posted on December 22nd, 2007 @ 8:13 pm
b_d for some Toki love, but minus points for not taking to opportunity to pimp Yoshiyuki Sadamoto’s concept art until our eyes bled rainbows of pure bliss.
The non-art merits of this film are deservedly recognised and it’s a thoroughly enjoyable watch in that sense. Ultimately, for me at least, it will always be unadulterated eye-porn because Sadamoto’s work is so well used/animated/thrillingly stuffed down our pants. I’m a shallow horrible person, yes, but yknow. Sadamoto. :/