Hana to Alice: Satsujin Jiken

After transferring to Ishinomori Middle School, Tetsuko "Alice" Arisugawa overhears her classmates discussing a strange rumor. The previous occupant of her seat, a nondescript "Judas," is missing and presumed murdered—poisoned by one of his four wives. Amidst dealing with her mother's undesired meddling in her affairs and warding off her classmates' bullying, the troubled Alice starts to investigate the mystery surrounding Judas' disappearance.

The trail of clues leads her to the house of her next-door neighbor, the quirky and reclusive Hana Arai. After an awkward introduction, Hana agrees to help Alice and formulates a plan that may lead them to the answers they seek. The two girls embark on a journey to uncover what happened to Judas, and perhaps a friendship may start to blossom between the two along the way.

[Written by MAL Rewrite]

Arisugawa, Tetsuko Main

Aoi, Yuu Japanese

Arai, Hana Main

Suzuki, Anne Japanese

Mutsu, Mutsumi Supporting

Suzuki, Ranran Japanese

Tomonaga Supporting

Kaku, Tomohiro Japanese

Arai, Tomomi Supporting

Kimura, Midoriko Japanese

Arisugawa, Kayo Supporting

Aida, Shoko Japanese

Kuroyanagi, Kenji Supporting

Hiraizumi, Sei Japanese

Ogino, Satomi Supporting

Kuroki, Haru Japanese

Tsutsumi, Yuki Supporting

Kimura, Tae Japanese

Yuda, Koutarou Supporting

Katsuji, Ryou Japanese

Ishii, Tomohiko Producer, Planning

Iwasa, Naoki Producer

Iwai, Shunji Director, Script, Theme Song Lyrics, Planning, Music, Original Creator, Editing

Shiina, Kotone Theme Song Performance

Reviews

Sep 15, 2015

coffeeworld

Recommended

How should put this.... The story was just simple but has a very DEEP MEANING. The entire time, I was just smiling and laughing. The story was so ASIAN. You know... not your Disney thing of coming of age. I don't know if Westerners and European viewers would find this as Exagerrated and find this stupid... Just so you know, As an Asian, though am not a Japanese, ..... tales, superstitions, and myths is very common in asian Countries. You know what? I laugh so hard because the film is just pretty realistic, I laugh because I realized how stupid I was during my highschool ... days. This film just nailed on how are we before. I love how the story was delivered in a very simple way. What a lovely and heart warming story. It's simple but it's deep.

It started with Alice being a transferee and then she came to a School where her classroom had a story. She became the center of attraction due to the story of her desk, and then I just realized that I was already hooked along with the story. WHAT IS THE REAL STORY OF HER DESK?! Then suddenly, I was already in a friendship story, to discovery, to the truth and to the reality, How fragile human feeling is. You can't move on if you don't know the truth, and you can't move unless you accept the reality. Or else you'll suffer and live with a stagnant life. You must also know when you are suffering, you might don't know, somebody out there is also suffering because of your sufferings. Watch your actions, or you might cause sufferings to others without your realizations. What an EYE OPENER film.

Regarding its animation, I find it more like a Live action than an Anime. It's not weird, but it's really good.

Overall, I enjoyed this film a lot. Very simple but worth watching.

Reviewer’s Rating: 9

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Jan 14, 2016

Flawfinder

Mixed Feelings

The animated prequel to the 2004 Japanese film, Hana and Alice, never got much buzz around the anime community to the point that I'm surprised it ever got subbed at all. And even then, the subs flew past my attention given how it came out around the ending weeks of the last summer season and I spent nearly four months ignorant of its existence. I checked my MAL friends' stats and neither of them have seen it either (well one guy did, but you don't know him). Since I enjoy dabbling in the obscure from time to time, especially given this film's pedigree, I figured ... I'd give this thing some attention, so Noragami Aragoto can wait another week to get reviewed.

So The Case of Hana & Alice reunites the director and the two actresses who play our leads, now diving into the rotoscoped animation field in order to tell the story of how our title characters first met each other and grew into bitchy high school students that nearly split apart over a guy thanks to, well, a guy funnily enough. Investment in the first film isn't necessary, as I barely remember anything about it apart from the fact that Alice likes to do ballet and I could still easily follow what was going on. Now I haven't seen much of Shunji Iwai's stuff, but if his Hana & Alice films are anything to go by, he loves to focus on everyday life quite a bit. Whilst that's not always a bad thing, the good everyday life stories use the mundane setting as a template for all sorts of complex issues whilst the bad ones wallow in nostalgia like a crappy fanmade sequel. What side does The Case of Hana & Alice lay on? Well let's look at the plot, shall we?

The film starts with Alice moving into a new neighborhood thanks to her mother's divorce and having to adjust to a few things that are standard for transferring schools such as getting a new uniform and having to deal with the City Council for a student ID. Although that stuff is only mentioned briefly, as the real conflict comes from how Alice's class treats her like an outsider thanks to sitting at a desk that belonged to a former student who was said to have died in her very chair, as well as having four wives to boot. Sick of having to deal with everyone's bullshit, Alice confronts her assaulters and discovers that they were just cashing in on a rumor in order to act like big men around the new kids because teens are stupid like that. During her interrogation, Alice realizes that the guy who died lived in her current house before she moved in and in an attempt to dispel the "ghost" rumors, asks next-door neighbor and local shut-in Hana to help her find out if the guy is still alive. Although reluctant to help, Hana eventually concedes and the two go on a modern-day Whisper of the Heart-esque adventure across the city in order to discover the truth whilst forming the friendship that would make up the basis for their first movie along the way.

The Case of Hana & Alice is best summed up as a movie version of those light-hearted slice of life stories that anime fans who wallow in nostalgia tend to bust a nut over, except rotoscoped. But the movie is no Aku no Hana in terms of tone, because whilst it portrays the struggles of a teenage girl more realistically than most slice-of-life stories, said portrayal is hampered by a lack of forward momentum along with the fact that it's very safe execution-wise. Alice and Hana don't even meet, let alone go on that "whimsical" adventure I referenced in my summary, until the halfway point, so you have to put up with Alice going through every day struggles for no other reason than she's a Japanese girl trying to fit in and do ballet as a motivation for wanting to watch her. Some of the scenes in the first half are cute, such as Alice punching a bully when he threw a chicken bone at her and him crying like a baby whilst doing so, but they don't add up to anything resembling an actual story with actually engaging drama, especially considering Alice is too capable a character to let teasing get her down forever.

Things get more interesting when Hana shows up because of her shut-in nature, along with the reveal of the reason for why she's a shut-in in the first place and how it ties in with everything that transpired previously, but it never results in anything as grand as Whisper of the Heart's ultimate message regarding the right way to follow your dreams. In fact, the only time the film truly stands out is when it uses its rotoscoped nature for some dynamic movement like when Alice runs up some stairs or when she and Hana dance in the moonlight (you'll understand once you see it). Ultimately, this movie just wants to be a light-hearted origin story for its main duo, keeping things accessible to a general audience whilst not really giving them any more substance than the Peanuts movie. If you're into that sort of thing, I'd recommend The Case of Hana & Alice for one watch because as I've said before, whilst the film is ultimately good-natured and never really delves into the hilarious ribbing you'd see in a Western sitcom, its non-saccharine approach to what teenage girls go through along with the number of moderately funny jokes did a fair enough job in terms of entertaining me at points, so you should enjoy the movie more than I did.

All in all, not a bad attempt in terms of a live-action director switching to animation for the first time. It's just a shame that unless his other movies are wildly different from the Hana & Alice stuff, he hasn't picked up much storytelling ambition in the decade between films. But then again, we can't all be Martin Scorsese now can we?

Reviewer’s Rating: 6

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Feb 7, 2017

buunny

Not Recommended

The story is disjointed. The first half of the story barely has any relation to the second half. Many characters are introduced in the first half that are not mentioned again later on.

Any character development is abandoned by the middle and is a plot devise to move the "story" along. Alice's involvement in track and ballet are used to make her more interested in "Judas". However, she reveals to Hana that she has no interest in finding out about him. Both leads are static.

There is a forced scene in the middle that leads to an hour of filler. The original story was a one volume ... manga that could have fit into a 30 minute OVA. They stretched it so they could attract film distributors, but sacrificed the quality of the movie for earnings potential.

The animation was cheap. The backgrounds were photos put through a photoshop filter. The characters were traced. The expressions were off and the reactions were delayed. The most effort was put into the poster, projecting a false image of what the movie looks like.

The music was not bad, but it was plagiarized. When Alice is in a park, Moonlight Sonata is playing, but at the melancholy drop, it changes to a different piece.

Overall, the original story was stretched out. The art was cheap to the point that it was detrimental to the story telling. The music was plagiarized. There was no character development.

Reviewer’s Rating: 2

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