Aru Machi Kado no Monogatari

'Tales of a Streetcorner,' as this is known in English, is a unique and very artistic film that reminds me of early Disney animation. I'd have never even heard of this hidden gem had a friend not directed me towards it, and it was well worth the half-hour or so it took to watch it.

'Streetcorner' has not one word of dialogue (not counting the print on the posters, which I can't read anyway), communicating mood entirely through music and expression. Not only that, there is only one actually human character, a gender-ambiguous child who is never named or speaks. As ... such, it's hard to get a hold of the plot, which seems to be largely a metaphor for the wars that wracked Europe in the first half of the 20th century. The streetcorner's true life comes from the posters, oddly enough, the advertisements filling the walls with life and music until being brutally stamped out by war propaganda posters. In particular is a big, blue mustachioed man who appears to be a combination of Stalin and Hitler (mustache resembles the former, the 'seig heil' salute the latter), who covers everything with his monotonous image of death and loyalty.

Our heroes consist of a mouse who befriends a child's lost teddy bear (or tries to; the bear is unresponsive, being only a stuffed animal) and a pair of posters for musicians, a violinist and a pianist, who fall in love only to be separated by the omnipresent dictator. There is also a mischievous moth who appears to have its own agenda of causing trouble, possibly a metaphor for America. This movie bears re-watching, in order to sift through the layers of metaphor and hidden meaning.

Story: 4 - Not really anything unique, and it's pretty buried in vague metaphor
Art: 7 - A unique art style, with touches of period Disney ... captures the time wonderfully
Sound: 9 - I loved the music, which is good since there's no dialogue
Character: 6 - Amazing how much personality a piece of paper can have
Enjoyment: 7 - It kept me captivated for all of its 35 minutes or so
Overall: 7 - A fantastic score and unique art style make up for the lack of human characters

Story

Writing about works like this is always a bit tricky, because the movie will at best appeal to a small percentage of the people reading this review. The challenge is always to make the show appear as repellant as possible to those that cannot and will not appreciate it, while at the same time recommending the movie to those that will actually like it. Essentially, this 1962 Tezuka short is not for “anime fans,” but “animation fans” – a subtle distinction to some, but a crucial one. Tezuka made the movie long before the stylistic distinctions that differentiate Japanese animation from the rest of the ... world came onto the scene. The heavily deformed character designs, giant robots and maid/schoolgirl/robot/whatever fetishes that the medium has become (in)famous for are all but absent.
Many will disagree with me on this, but Tales of a Street Corner can hardly be described as “anime” in terms of what the English definition of the word has come to mean. Thus, there is little here that will appeal to the standard Naruto-loving, DBZ-hating anime fan. They’ll balk at the primitive visuals, the slow plot, and the largely experimental approach. They’ll wonder where the kawaii schoolgirls/super-powered shonen have gone, and why most of the “characters” in the movie are actually inanimate objects.
On the other hand, a true fan of animation itself (one who appreciates anime not for its now commercialized mass appeal but for its occasional bursts of immense creativity) could very well love this. When Tezuka made the short, he was entirely unconcerned with profitability or broad appeal. Rather, he had his mind on something rarely seen today in the modern Japanese anime industry: creating art for art’s sake.
As a result, many people are going to get hung up on the first 20 or so minutes of the short, which is basically nothing more than world building. I found the beginning vaguely charming and entertaining, but Im afraid most are going to become deathly bored by the time the actual conflict of the show finally arrives.
By the end, the events in the show are clearly meant to be allegorical; obviously no one would care about the “lives” of posters on a wall or a tree spreading seeds if they did not represent something larger. In this case, they are used to show the effect war has on a community.
As a whole, the storyline is clever, creative, and poignant. Basically, this is the reason people will like Tales of a Street Corner, assuming they like it at all.


Animation

The animation is certainly not on the level of sophistication that has become the norm in modern shows, but is also not without merit. Tezuka uses the technology at hand extremely well, and the visuals as a whole are extremely creative and tell the story well.
For instance, rather than animate a walking soldier (who, with the animation standards of the time, would have looked marginal at best), Tezuka opts to show only the soldier’s marching boots. This image alone is enough to put the actual idea of a soldier in your head without getting caught up in the meaningless details. The result lends the short film a universal feel that works well with the allegorical approach of the story.
Also, even though the actual animation is limited, the visuals themselves are colorful, vibrant, and nice to look at.


Sound

Instrumental pieces coupled with the occasional sound effect or two. As a whole, I thought the soundtrack fit the work well - no complaints here.

Characters

Tales of a Street Corner hosts a plethora of truly bizarre characters. I have already mentioned the pair of walking boots, wall posters and a tree. These are all major characters, and get about as much screentime as any of the more traditional characters in the short (a little girl and an assortment of Disney-esque animals round out the cast).
As in most experimental shorts, none of the characters are particularly well developed, and many are intended to be symbolic. For instance, an intimidating poster of a mustached man in a uniform represents fascism, and the one human character in the show, a girl, is probably meant to represent childhood in general.
The plethora of characters is used to develop the actual street corner in which they reside into a living, breathing character of its own. By the end, I felt an emotional attachment to the street corner in and of itself - an impressive feat, given the brevity of the work.


Overall

If the audience can look past the unorthodox approach and the extremely dated animation, they’ll find a surprisingly profound anti-war piece that manages to say more with no dialogue than most shows (or this review, for that matter) could with ten thousand words. Unfortunately, this is a pretty big "if," and most likely only active fans of "the weird stuff" should consider this.

Rate a 6
Audio is background not vocal
art piece

Story
Had a good opening that stressed who the main characters were and the roles they played. Only thing i would have added is a little more of a background for some of the same characters slightly later on at some point. Conclusion was unclear. On one had you can see it as tragic as the other you can see it as merciful/just. While telling a story with animated characters with no subtitles or vocals is a real challenge. Which to be fair was handled generally well. Although, the pain the viewer was suppose to take was unknown. Movies ... to me are supposed to have their message almost screaming out to the viewer. If they want you to cry they will make you cry. Laugh when they want you to laugh. Here it is like the narrator left the room and left you alone with the band and artist. While you and them can't exactly see eye to eye nor can speak it allows for wide ranges of miscommunications.

Art
-Worked with story. Art was not as fine tuned as what we see now a days. This art had the feeling it was painted rather than drawn.
-art also did a good job at expressing most emotions from those you would not think could express emotions.

Sound 10/10
If the challenge was the use of symbolism instead of direction(vocals). For the music got low when a sad moment arrived and upbeat during high moments.

Character- unclear other than the minor information given at the beginning.

Enjoyment
This animation for me is historical. Showed a lot of possible connections and relations one could connect to. Like an evil boss or unfair life. Art major would appreciate this.