Review: Weathering With You
3
0
Weathering With You is a Japanese movie that centers around a fugitive teenage boy who flees from home to Tokyo and faces multiple episodes of crime, love, and difficult decision-making. While its plot and theme are like any other fantasy film about love and sacrifice, the brilliant animations and soundtrack are reason enough to watch the highly-rated film.
Being just 15 years old, Hodoka Morishima runs away from his island home because he feels “suffocated there” and pursues life in the rainy, metropolitan city of Tokyo. Shortly thereafter, he finds a dreadfully low-wage job and stumbles across a pistol while traversing the alleys of Tokyo. When cameras captured footage of his possession of the gun, he became a fugitive, gun-possessing minor criminal. Then he meets and falls in love with Hina Amano, the “sunshine girl” who can control the weather with prayers; but the ability comes at the expense of becoming a sacrifice to the heavens.
Weathering With You’s animations were charming from the very start of the movie. With such a heavy focus on rain and water, the animators did an exceptional job of imbuing the water with life and activity. The film’s pictures and scenes felt more lively than any other anime or anime movie I have watched.
Perhaps the most captivating part of the movie was its soundtrack: a set of instrumentals that perfectly underlined and sometimes carried scenes. The piano-heaviness of the music made it all the more appropriate for a film based on rainfall, romance, and risk-taking. But a particular detail from the music was that it became twisted during climatic, darker scenes. For example, when Hodoka dreams of Hina subliming into the sky, the piano is accompanied by a pressing, distorted chord: although subtle, it effectively gives the scene a uniquely ominous vibe.
While Weathering With You has many praisable points, its plot and scheme are blandly unoriginal. It is a high school romance that involves sacrifice and fugitive activity for another person. Still, its concept of weather control and heavenly powers, paired with amazing music and perfect animation make it a movie worth watching.
