i have seen a couple of Hayao Miyazaki’s anime. *my neighbour totoro, kiki’s delivery service * and others. needless to say i am impressed. so when i read the dope and came across numerous recommendations to watch grave of the fireflies if you wanted a touching story, i settled in for a good watch.
grave of the fireflies sucked. totoro is more touching. bleh.
on preview: no wonder. it’s not directed by miyazaki.
I’d have to say that it’s visually impressive as any anime I’ve ever seen, but while the ending was sad, it wasn’t “devastating” in the way so many other tend to characterize it. Plus, I was hoping to see more of what happened that led to the boy to the state he was in at the beginning of the film, but they end on the “tear-jerking” moment, which was a little too abrupt for me.
So I wouldn’t say it “sucked”, but I am inclined to call it a bit overrated.
right, it’s overrated. i was just so disappointed as it was the first studio ghibli show that failed to move me.
I have it, but haven’t watched it. I’d read so many comments on how much of a tear jerker it is, that I only got through about the first 20 minutes. I knew where it was going, and I didn’t feel up for the ride.
But if I’m hearing that it wasn’t as moving as many have said it was, my interest has been re-awakened. I might actually watch it now.
I wouldn’t call it devastating but watching someone lose everything while trapped in a world of apathy and destruction it heart rending.
It’s worst moments are the quiet moments where you can tell the characters just don’t know what to do yet all they can do is think too tired to even hope.
Not overrated, in my opinion. It does make certain demands on the viewer, such as a fairly long attention span, the ability to empathize, and a basic grasp of mid-20th century world history.
Eh. I didn’t like Totoro nearly as much- I thought Totoro was kind of pointless- but I didn’t feel the same way about Grave of The Fireflies as most people seem to do. It was sort of sad, but… I wrote about it in my live journal, actually http://www.livejournal.com/users/elfkin477/
Grave of the Fireflies made me cry.
It’s difficult to watch, but I really liked it.
Theme, narrative structure, character development - I can’t fault this movie on any of these accounts. It’s just that, well… it’s an animated cartoon, with drawing of people with oversized eyes. Don’t get me wrong: Guernica and Francis Bacon’s “scraming pope” paintings are mightily evocative without being photographic, but I just can’t get past my innability to become emotionally involved with cartoon characters.
Maybe it’s just my Saturday morning conditioning, or maybe not. I mean, I really liked Art Speigelmann’s Maus, which was playing the form of the comic book against itself. Because it was a comic book, with cat Nazis and mouse Jews, it was stronger (for me) than Schindler’s List. Forgive the artspeak, but it turned my expectations against me with a vengance.
But GOTF doesn’t try to be anything besides or beyond an animated cartoon, albeit one with excellent narrative virtues. Frankly, if it had been done in black an white with live actors, I could have taken those kids a lot more to heart.
I’m curious. Are any of you who are underwhelmed by GotF parents? Before I had kids of my own I don’t think it would have affected me so strongly. Now I find it so painful as to be virtually unwatchasle.
heh, put the shotgun down. but you might have scored a hit out of three - empathy.
[spoiler]i couldn’t get pass the depiction of the children lazing about their guardian’s house expecting to be treated like the nobility they think they are, especially with the boy old enough to be out doing something useful. later, when it is evident that the poor girl is suffering from malnutrition and sickness, the boy chose to steal instead of looking for help from his guardian, his relatives or his friends.
his poor sister died for his young pride.
[/spoiler]
shijinn
Wow did you watch another movie or something? The ‘guardian’ stole all the money and items that were rightfully the kid’s then treated them like crap. The kid couldn’t just go out and get a job there were no jobs he was already semi starved anyway what work could he do?
As for reaching out I think it was clear at that point nobody would give him anything. If he would have shown up at his guardian’s doorstep she would have put a boot in his ass I bet.
I think I must have watched a different version. In the one I saw the boy had money in the bank but didn’t make any attempt to get it until the sister was already dying.
It’s a very sad movie with not too much of a payoff except making the viewer very sad. If you want to be made sad, definitely, this movie is all you.
A lot people aren’t too hip on a movie that brings and enforces a “negative feeling” (for lack of a better term), and understandably so. But the animation quality is quite good IMHO and the sentiment is genuine and honest.
i watched the same version (sub, if there’s any difference) as elfkin477’s 