Ranked #1273

Night on the Galactic Railroad

This is a movie for dreamers. That's as simple as I can state it. It evokes strong interest and emotion from the viewer. I was on the edge of my seat. It is paced much like an odyssey-traveling along an ever changing magical landscape that you feel you are becoming part of. The artwork has a simplistic beauty that is extremely pleasing to the eye. There is a feeling of drama and intensity all throughout, even in the smallest of scenes you feel as if you are on the verge of-something, something big. This movie is for the fantasy, fairytale and visual experience fans. I feel like I have just watched my first piece of fantastical anime. That's a pretty huge feeling, I hope you can share the same. read more

Night on the Galactic Railroad, or Ginga Tetsudou no Yoru, may be based on a children's book, but it's definitely a movie anyone can enjoy. To be completely honest, I think I would've been seriously scared had I watched this when I was younger - it's quite creepy at times. Almost all characters in NotGR are cats with human proportions for some reason. I don't know if this was the case in the original book, but I never felt like it mattered, actually. Judging from the synopsis, it was because the animators were lazy, and that may've been the case for all I know.

The story starts off on an Italian-esque countryside, on the day of the so called Centaurus Festival. We are introduced to the movie's main character, a blue cat named Giovanni, who apparently is being bullied because of his father's line of work (smuggler) and is living together with his sister and sickly mother. When the night of the festival draws near, he is once again ostracized by the other kids - or should I say kittens? - and runs up on a hill from which he gazes up on the starry sky with awe. Suddenly, a flash of light appears and with it a magnificient train, which he boards together with his only friend Campanella, who was following him up the hill. Together they embark on a compelling journey as the train moves across the Milky Way.

The first thirty or so minutes of the movie are horribly slow, but after the characters have boarded the train, the pacing is screwed up a notch or two.

With the movie being made in 1985, it's no surprise that its animation is dated. Especially the characters look very simple, without much detail to them. On the other hand, the sceneries the two cats encounter during their journey are highly imaginitive; a walnut-littered excavation site of some kind of gigantic dinosaur skeleton; an immense field of corn with an unsuspended pendulum swinging in the blue sky above. And the like. I don't want to spoil too much, but there are some really interesting vistas to be seen. Night on the Galactic Railroad might not be as technically competent as contemporary Ghibli movies, but it certainly has got heart.

Cats and even some humans board the train and disappear into thin air as suddenly as they came, lending the movie an even more mysterious atmosphere. There aren't any deep personalities to be found here, though, but I doesn't matter - it's the journey and the journey alone that is the core of this movie and it's interesting enough.

Night on the Galactic Railroad features mostly classical music. Among the tracks we find the New World Sympony and Halleluja Chorus for example. Looking at the latter of those two, it's not too surprising that there are some Christian elements incorporated into the story more or less obviously, like it or not. Putting that aside, the music fits the mood most of the time, but there are some creepy, more ambient tunes that seem sort of misplaced in their context. Which in a way only serves to make the atmosphere even more creepy.

So, to summarize, this movie was quite a trip. It's very slow-paced in the beginning, but if you get past the first boring thirty minutes, you're in for an experience unlike any other. read more