When it was first released in 2016, the plaintiffs Your name became the highest grossing anime in Japan. Today, its aftermath, Dealing With Problems With You, was released in Japan. The movie shares many plot and creative themes Your name. The result is good but wrong.
Warning: These reviews include light spoilers.
Dealing With Problems With You tells the story of a Japanese high school student named Hodaka fleeing to a small island that he calls Tokyo, where rain never appeared. There, he struggles to find a job and eventually ends up getting a gig in a magical magazine, where he is assigned to follow a rumor. the hare-onna (晴 れ 女) or "open weather," supposedly able to control the sky. Hodaka falls in love with a girl named Hina, who hears about the rumors the hare-onna.
(In Japanese, there is a name called stand still (雨 男) or "person of rain," and it means that wherever the amen goes, it follows the rain. While the movie doesn't portray this well, Hodaka is an automatic. For the text, the character works differently to Hina. This hasn't been fully explored, but it did make for an interesting foundation.)
The Your name comparisons are unavoidable. This movie is not fake. Stylistically, Dealing With Problems With You it is full of signature shots of director Makoto Shinkai of Tokyo cityscape. The rock group Radwimps return again when you score.
As is the case with the previous film, Dealing With Problems With You it blends Shinto beliefs with modern Japanese life. In Shinto religion, there is a tradition of praying for good weather, too Keeping Up With You describes how in the past, how those who made direct contact with the climate practiced prayers and rituals in clear weather. True, Japan has a long-lasting spiritual connection to the sun.
And as Your name, Shinkai also makes a positive difference between these elements of Japanese traditional culture and modern life. For example, teru teru bozu, looking like little ghosts, appear throughout the film. Teru teru bozu literally means "priestess worshiper," and these little rings are still made today in tissue paper, often children praying for a bright sky. As in Japanese society, Buddhist and Shinto beliefs are marginalized Dealing With Problems With You.
But just the opposite Your name, where Tokyo was a chic city with fashionable streets and delicious food, Tokyo for Dealing With Problems With You it is full of dingy streets, worn stairs, old romantic hotels and shady characters. It is a unforgiving, wet and cold place, where people have to do anything to survive.
During the beginning of the Tokyo montage, a "Vanilla" truck hired women in the sex industry, playing the recruiting job and giving women a "very lucrative job". You will definitely hear that in the real streets of Tokyo, but it is the first time you have ever heard that in anime. It was attacking and unexpected, and that was probably the point.
Hodaka starts applying for a part-time job, but the answers she receives are for jobs fuzoku (the porn industry). You go to a series of conversations, maybe to manage one of these types of places, and you succumb to future types by being too small. Without choosing a job, he ends up on the road, tired and hungry. It's a spooky view of Tokyo and one that isn't typically shown in domain anime or Japanese movies. This is not Tokyo for Your name, and in this case, it makes a pretty big difference.
But that's the problem. What Dealing With Problems With You compared Your name, highlights the film's most recent weaknesses. Components of Your name they are passive and dumb, but the high emotional points are removed with deep, emotional meaning on many levels. For example, Your name makes many indirect references to Japan Earthquake and Tsunami. For audiences in Japan, the image evokes memories of immense power.
However, at Dealing With Problems With You, real-world weather communication seems to be muted and as a missed opportunity. The weather in Japan has long been predictable. But over the last few years, Japan's climate, such as the global climate, has become more widespread, less threatening, and dangerous. In the movie, it's talked about how the weather has been changing, but it's about how spring and summer have been fun for kids in Japan. Nothing about how dangerous this weather has been. And from a movie's perspective on the power of the weather, the impact is less.
While divine things are powerful within Your name feel organic, powerful elements inside Dealing With Problems With You, especially later in the film, don't. More Dealing With Problems With YouThe plot sounds like a building, it is designed to turn viewers into certain scenes, and certain elements of the story are brutal and seemingly at home with your typical Hollywood film. While the characters are sympathetic, some of the decisions made later in the movie become quite self-centered, with little thought given the grand motivations of their actions. They are young men, so I think that makes sense, but when faced with the consequences of those decisions, there doesn't seem to be much light or thought given to them.
That doesn't mean it Dealing With Problems With You it's a bad movie. Not at all. That's fine. Go see it. The parts of the movie are incredibly moving. Shinkai's ability to compare religion to ancient Japanese culture and modern society continues to fascinate. She is an exciting filmmaker, and I look forward to seeing what she does in her next film.
But in the end, that's a big problem Dealing With Problems With You this is: it's a follow-up Your name. Thankfully, the next film will not have that issue.
This review was first published on July 19, 2019.
