Grave of the Fireflies
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Movie Reviews of Grave of the Fireflies
Movie Review: Heart Wrenching
Summary: 5 Stars
I am not one to cry at movies, and this one is no exception. I'm just not that kind of woman. My husband and I watched it together after unearthing an ancient copy in our local Best Buy. Numerous times throughout the film I found my eyes stinging, a lump in my throat causing me to hitch in a short breath, my heart aching as I watched. My husband was unabashedly weeping through the entire video. He had been expecting something along the lines of other Studio Ghibli films and at an especially emotional point in the film he turned to me and said "What kind of Studio Ghibli film *is* this?!"
The basic premise of the film is the view of WWII from the standpoint of two children. They are alone, bereft, taken advantage of, abused and neglected. But there is laughter, the easy delight of the very young in something as simple as a trip to the beach, a piggy-back ride and chasing fireflies in the night. And there is love, and the heart-breaking feeling of despair when one's absolute best is just not enough.
While this is animated, it is not a cartoon, and it is not, seemingly, like other Studio Ghibli films. If you are expecting something mythical like Spirited Away, Nausica of the Valley of the Winds, or Princess Mononoke, you might be in for a surprise. This does not deal with old gods or spirits of the forest. It doesn't deal with the enduring conflict of humans with their environment and our pending destruction of it or address the loss of our esoteric beliefs and the neglect of the magic that we could find in the world if we only looked. But, it does know how, as many Studio Ghibli films, to touch something in people's hearts, to make them feel for the characters, to make them think, and to make them weep. The themes of this Studio Ghibli film are much more real and in some cases could strike very close to home.
I highly recommend Grave of the Fireflies to anyone and everyone. It's an amazing work of art visually. And, the tale, while dated, still has an important message to send out to those who have heart enough to hear it.
The themes dealt with in this film are not necessarily those that all viewers would want to expose their children to. While most Studio Ghibli films are delights for adults and children of all ages, this one might warrant a preview by parents before allowing their children to watch it. It does not deal with anything inappropriate; there is no nudity or strong language. However, the film is based on WWII and pulls no punches. These children go through horrible experiences that some parents might not be ready to explain to their children.
Movie Review: how many people will have cried by watching the movie?
Summary: 5 Stars
Maybe, in U.S.A even the name of Hayao Miyazaki will be known here and there. He made many movies till now, Spirited Away, Totoro etc. But the best work that I was moved very much is this movie, Grave of the Fireflies. In Japan, though this movie have been taken high evaluation from all Japanese, is not known more than other Miyazaki's works like Spirited Away. Maybe the same thing will be said in U.S.A. It is very regretable. For instance, this movie was roadshowed with Neighbor Totoro. Main movie was Totoro, and Grave was sab movie.
If the watchers are children, their favorite work may be Totoro, but in the point of letting us think about more deep things, peace, love, tenderness, the strong bond between brothers or our happiness that can eat many foods, this movie will be more high splendid movie than Totoro. When I watch this movie, I feel that I am getting many things than the age of this movie, especially foods, but in the other hands, I thought that I was losing many things, tenderness for others etc for letting me fllow in daily benefit, money. Ceatainly they had many trouble on surface aspect, but in the mental points, I am inferior to them because they had the strong family bond like never broken even if they were in the severe condition.
This movie is true story on Akiyuki Nosaka's same title novel book. In the movie, the shelter cave where Nosaki and his sister lived actually was re-showed. Nosaka was very surprised to the animation re-creation power.
I was eight years old when I watched the movie first time. At that time, I felt why they went out from their aunt's house and dared to live in shelter cave, should live in the house even if they flattered to the aunt. But as I have grown, the thinking changed little by little. Though the selection might not be clever, they wished to live by themselves and be free.
If there may be opinions that children should not watch the movie. But though I watched the work in my child age, there was never the bad influence, to the contrary even now the movie have strong impact for me on good meaning. Because this movie is on true story, we should not turn our eyes away from the movie. If we gaze to true things, peace will be made too. I do not dare to talk about which countries should have the war responsibility. The most expecting thing is that people over the world can feel the non sence of war by watching the sorrow movie. If war broke on the point of the benefit of countries, we should stop war by feeling the sympathy to sacrifices for absurd wars.
Thank you for reading poor English to last scentence.
Movie Review: Probably one of the most powerful anti-war films I've seen
Summary: 5 Stars
I've seen plenty of war films, including Schindler's List and Saving Private Ryan as well as Hamburger Hill and Thin Red Line. With such a grim topic like war, you'd think those films would've made me cry, well nope. While the war scenes were superbly staged, the emotional content was missing, as if the only reason you wanted to care was because it was people dying. But when you actually care about them, it goes beyond just a simple caring, you feel like you lost someone as well. This film more than any anti-war film shows that horrors can happen to everyone, not just soldiers.
Seito and Setsuko are brother and sister living in WWII-era Japan. A bombing raid forces both of them to retreat and they end up in a shelter. From there they have to deal with an overbearing aunt, trying to keep Setsuko calm while bombs are being dropped and hunger. So we follow the 2 of them living day to day just trying to survive.
Brad Bird, who worked on the Simpsons and obviously did Iron Giant and the Incredibles, tends to get upset when people call animation a genre, saying instead it's another way to tell a story. The story just happens to be animated and I agree. Granted, animation has its own look, much like B&W versus color but animation is simply storytelling but with pencils rather than sets. And if there was ever a case where animation can be art, Fireflies sure makes a strong one. Make no mistake, this is a really depressing film. By the end, I was literally in tears. The subject matter's grim enough but what plays out is quite sad.
I watched the Japanese sub and I don't know if I want to try the English one but the Japanese one was perfect, especially Setsuko who just sounded adorable and heartbreaking when she feels ill. I actually couldn't find the Special Edition one with some goodies on it so the only features on here where trailers and the option of watching the film storyboarded. It's not much but I'll probably pick up the bigger release later on.
Even though I do think the film's masterpiece level, I probably will only watch it a few times. Unlike some of my favorite films ever where I can watch it whenever, Fireflies is rare where you absolutely love the film but you're maybe not up to watching it a second time. That's ok because all it takes is one viewing.
Movie Review: A powerful film, particularly appropriate for generations lucky enough to never have experienced war first hand.
Summary: 5 Stars
Besides what all, including myself, write about the powerful message and meaning of this film, it should also be made clear that this is a great film--period. Not just a great anime, or a great work of "Asian cinema" or Japanese cinema. This is a film which anyone who loves fine movie-making will be glad to not have missed and is worthy of anyone's very elite collection if they have one.
My review would not change if this were a film using live actors, though it would take an entire cast and crew with superhuman filmmaking abilities to even remotely match the power of this film. Frankly, this could not be done with live actors; you would need every single person working on the film to have suffered war themselves, as non-combatants, in order to capture the genuine anguish expressed by the characters here. The faces of the characters are clearly those of the principle animator, conveying an experience in a way that is not embellished or dramatized for an attempt at greater effect.
There are times when you will look into the eyes of these anime characters and see the intensity of emotion and experience that you would only expect could be seen in the eyes of a refugee of ethnic cleansing or, in the case of Japan, children who were surrounded by the decimation of everything that was good and secure about their lives prior to war--and yet are still children with normal curiousities, needs, and instincts.
Having lived in Japan for nearly a decade myself, and talked to many who were children during and at the end of the war, I can say that there's no dissimilarity between the personal stories I've heard and those of the characters in the film. And since it is rare for an American to have the experience or patience to sit and listen to someone who has had such an experience, I recommend this film most highly to serve the purpose.
No one who sees this film and understands that it is not a dramatization or embelleshment should fail to get the message--that this is not about special, Japanese children, but about all children displaced by war, and that it is as true of kids in Yugoslavia or Somalia or Iraq today as it was of Japan back then.
Movie Review: A true masterpiece of animation!
Summary: 5 Stars
Based on an autobiographical novel by Akiyuki Nosaka, Studio Ghibli delivers a riveting story of World War II. The movie tells the story of two orphaned children who have to stand on their own after losing their parents during the war.
Where to begin? Being a movie from Studio Ghibli the quality in animation is guaranteed, what makes this movie so compelling is the drama and the tragic turn of events in the lives of these two kids. The movie opens with the family running from a raid in their town, planes are passing by bombing and shooting at people. From there, the lives of these kids change dramatically, the situation of the war is not the only thing they have to deal with but relatives that help them more for obligation than wanting to do it, the indifference of the people of the town and the difficulty of getting something as basic as water and food during war times.
The main characters are well defined from the very beginning and the two siblings will make you cry a couple of times during the movie, the story is well adapted from the book and it perfectly demonstrates its point. You get to see how gradually their innocence is lost due the circumstances they had to live in, they have to suffer some horrible tests in moments that can be defined only as heartbreaking. The movie has hardly any music at all, but the more dramatic moments of the film are accompanied by a score that could not have fit better (sadly, the music writer doesn't get his credit on the American version of the DVD)
The extras offered in this edition might not be many, but the movie itself is a perfect excuse for buying this DVD. The only extras worth mentioning are the storyboards for the entire film included here. The sound mixing is pretty decent, you can watch the movie dubbed in English or in Japanese with subtitles in English; audio options are 5.1 Dolby digital stereo for both languages. Next to Miyazaki's films, this movie is a must for film collectors, anime at its best.