Suzume – Anime Movie Review

I’ve heard critics say, “Can Makoto Shinkai write only one movie?”, and I’d say this is pretty much him in a nutshell.

I love Kimi no na wa a lot, but Tenki no ko already was a disappointment, so after seeing the trailer for Suzume, I didn’t have many hopes for it anymore.
While I understand that sometimes you can’t let go of your previous works and it’s not necessarily a bad thing do use similar build-ups of previous movies, there’s a bit of a difference between using it as an inspiration and wanting to make the exact same thing, because that’s what’ll hit the market. Do big filmmakers still care about original stories or do they only want the money nowadays?

Now, most of the movie (Suzume) is actually original. The doors, the worm that wants to escape and the thing with the chair. No spoilers here, but how often do you have a chair as a main character?

While the setting itself is original, the execution is not.

Boy and Girl find each other, but fate doesn’t want to make it easy for them, so a huge world catastrophe happens, and they’re the only ones who can stop it. And they will, because they wanna be together.
Be it a meteorite, heavy rain and flooding, or worms coming out of doors which causes massive earthquakes. However bad it is, the pair will overcome it, because their love is so strong.

However, what love?
Do you really risk your life and the lives of countless other people, just to be with someone you’ve met a day ago?

The build-up works in Kimi no na wa, because they’ve known each other for a while, or, well, each other’s lives. It wasn’t just that they’re fighting for each other. When Taki saw the book of all the people who died, he recognized Mitsuha’s sister and grandmother too. And her two classmates/friends. He went back in time to not only save her, but her family and friends too. In the end, he saved the the whole town.

Sure, Suzume also saved lots of people and even whole Tokyo. But after her crush sacrificed himself for Tokyo, she couldn’t live without him. I get it’s her crush, but these two’ve known each other for a few days. And she acted as if her spouse of 30 years died.
It was just ridiculous at that point. Seeing how she was willing to end her own life or put whole Japan in danger, just so her crush could live. What now? Was this some late april fool’s joke? I really can’t tell anymore whether Makoto was being serious here or not.

And the thing is, it could’ve been so easily changed. By making them childhood friends for example. Yes, that’d be kinda cliché but it would make more sense on why they fight for each other so much.
And it wasn’t even him fighting for her, just Suzume. He kept telling her to go home. Which is logical, since he didn’t want to put her in any danger. Suzume was just a random girl from the street, who gave him directions. Nothing more. Even at the end, he didn’t seem like he would’ve done the same for her.
So it’s not only ridiculous how “obsessed” Suzume was over him, but also the fact how unbalanced their “love” for each other is, that makes this whole thing so pathetic.

And yes, I know how sad it is that it’s only the “love story” that ruined the whole movie for me. If people didn’t enjoy the romance in Kimi no na wa, that would’ve been fine, because it was more about saving a town and the whole time-travel aspect. However, in this movie, the “love” story was part of the main plot. It’s what got the plot started even, with Suzume’s crush on the stranger, who passed her on a random day on her way to school.
The way she got the crush was realistic, okay, but everything else afterwards just got more and more ridiculous.

Also, Suzume’s aunt was a tad too dramatic for my taste and her whole personality just seemed to have consisted of, “I can’t date and it’s Suzume’s fault”, which was pretty annoying. Really hate it when people make women all about love, dating and relationships.
I did like her character in itself, I also understand her, I’m just upset at Makoto for making her rather flat.

Overall:

• Animation: Very beautiful, even more so than in KNNW and TNK.
• Music: That one song from Radwimps. I don’t remember much of the other music, but this song is very beautiful.
• Characters:
  • The cats were cute, although creepy sometimes. 9/10.
  • Didn’t like Suzume and her dramatic obsession with her crush, willing to put whole Japan in danger, just to save him, whom she barely knew.
  • Loved the kind people she met on her travels. (Which also was kind of wasted potential; I feel like they could’ve added them to the plot, something along the lines of, “all the people I’ve met until now were so kind to me, even though they had no reason to be. Why would I let them just die? I can’t give up now, I have to save them”. Could’ve been a good monologue for Suzume, but she just pretty much took their kindness for granted. In a world where kindness is rare, I think this should’ve been put to the front a bit more. (Then again, maybe Makoto wants to show that kindness should be something obvious and not rare at all.))
• Story/Plot: didn’t like the love story, but everything else was good.
• Enjoyment: 50/50, meh. I teared up only once, and that was when something happened to the cats. It had funny bits tho.