Kimi no Na wa.

Ever since I was a child, I wanted to be an author. I’d write for days on end, using every ounce of my imagination, and then stored my works away in some secret drawer when I finished. Frightened to death of sneers and condescending laughter, I rarely shared my writings with anyone, only submitting them to a contest or two over the years. A couple of months ago, I heard that there was going to be a prestigious writer’s conference, known as Books Alive, in my town, where literary agents would search high and low for the next great author. Despite having a small amount ... of time to prepare, I pushed aside my fears and toiled furiously on a brief sample for a murder mystery that I was planning to write (you can read it at the end of my review). On the day of the conference, I approached one of the most famous agents there and, with a stutter and shaking hands, I presented my sample to the agent. She thoughtfully looked over what I had and, with as much grace as she could, turned me down. Before advising me to come back next year, she complimented my writing skills but said that I was too focused on establishing the setting rather than developing the characters in it.

That, my friends, is Your Name in a nutshell.

I thought that, after the disaster known as Erased, the good people of MyAnimeList would be more selective in what they label “great”, more reluctant to flock to whatever’s the biggest and brightest. I, of course, was wrong. Your Name, in no time at all, skyrocketed to the first spot on MAL’s Top Anime, and this fact is depressing. Apparently, anything that happens to look fantastic, and has a combination of time travel and “feelz” is automatically adored by the masses. Looking from afar, I thought there has to be more to this film than what’s on the surface. There has to be a reason why Makoto Shinkai, the director of Your Name, is hailed as “the next Miyazaki”. This is why I decided to watch Your Name and the result?

Well…….

The first few minutes are a work of art, with the story shifting the perspective back and forth from one character to the other, and the gorgeous animation overwhelming your eyeballs. If there’s one thing that I’ll remember about Your Name, it’s that this film is scenery porn at its finest. The cinematography won’t exactly captivate you but practically every frame in this work is shot with an impeccable eye for detail, making sure the smallest pieces of the environment don’t go unnoticed. It is this specialty that shines in Your Name’s greatest scene, where the protagonist scurries into a cave, running form the cold, constant, and unforgiving rain (It’s simply a beautiful sequence to witness). When it comes to camerawork, Erased clearly soars beyond the likes of Your Name. However, in a contest to smother the audience with its looks, this film is unrivaled.

Of course, just because something looks great doesn’t qualify it as the Citizen Kane of anime unless it has something beneath the glitz and glamour. You need something substantial that can provide a foundation for your film, like a quality cast of characters, and Your Name just doesn’t have it. Now, before you start dubbing me a hater, just wait – wait! – a second. Below, I have three requirements that I think a show should meet in order to have a quality cast.

1. Does the personality of the protagonists change at all?
2. Do the protagonists stand out?
3. Does the supporting cast matter?

These requirements aren’t long-winded or multi-faceted, and yet there’s no way you can tell me that Your Name meets any of them.

1 and 2. Taki and Mitsuha are our walking clichés of the day. There is no difference in who they are from start to finish. There isn’t one trait about either one of them that would make you remember them at all. I will give you a million dollars if you can prove me wrong on this one.

(Before I type any further, I want to talk about amnesia for a sec. It’s been the quintessential plot convenience device since, like, forever; while some writers were able to use amnesia in a realistic and convincing fashion, it has often required a copious amount of suspension of disbelief to make it work but here it borders on ridiculousness. Let’s say I met someone I haven’t seen in a while. We talk and then that person walks away. You seriously can’t expect me to FORGET THAT PERSON’S NAME A MINUTE LATER, right? Moving on…..)

3. Ummm, let’s see, there’s that one guy with a crush on Mitsuha, that restaurant chick with the torn dress, and Mitsuha’s family: her dad, sister, and grandma. Not one of them is someone you’d regard as memorable or important, and I just can’t understand for the life of me how that’s forgivable (Well, the grandma does have a pretty solid knowledge of what’s occurring in the plot).

“Character flaws, huh? You might have a point ther- OH MY GAWD THOSE STARS ARE SO PWETTY!”

To be completely honest, I became really bored when the animation ceased to amaze. The romance isn’t funny or interesting in the slightest. The characters are dull and boring. The plot is horrendously slow and uninspiring. This is what I thought while about to fall asleep…… and then the plot twist happened. It slammed into me like a sack of bricks, instantly breathing life into something that was on the verge of becoming forgettable. For those of you that weren’t half-conscious while watching Your Name, you might’ve seen the twist coming. For me, however, as soon as I saw the words “three years ago” at the bottom of the screen, I thought that the film was about to justify the hype. Instead of putting their heads together to create a finale for the ages, Your Name’s writers collectively shrugged their shoulders and settled for the cop-out of cop-outs: true love conquers all.

**and now for the writing sample that I promised to show you in the first paragraph**

Drenched in the all-consuming blanket of rain, leaning over the bridge’s rust-speckled rail, Don exhaled the whispery dark gray smoke that hailed from his wiry thin Newport cigarette, his fifth of the day. Don gazed thoughtfully at his reflection that appeared on the surface of the town’s heavily-polluted river, a mixture of juniper green and the darkest brown from the steady flow of the chemical waste from the most environmentally ignorant factories. Bystanders rushed to and fro, this way and that, attempting to escape the oppressive downpour of the sky’s sadness. Not Don. With the utmost carefulness, he ever so slowly rotated away from peering into the river; with his back and elbows resting on the rail, he observed them in their futile war against the natural elements. Attempting an informal method of saluting their efforts, Don’s hand scoured through his thoroughly soaked pocket before clenching an ancient but capable lighter. The hand glided out of Don’s pocket with the lighter in its clutches before illuminating the previously extinguished butt of the Newport that slouched limply on the private eye’s mouth. As the fire burned bright, Don was ready to inhale the remaining contents of the already-used cigarette when a particularly vicious gust of the chilly midmorning wind snuffed out the Newport’s flame. With an empathetic shrug of the shoulders, Don allowed the Newport to float gracefully from his lips onto the ground, where he boredly drilled the heel of his penny loafer into the cigarette and stirred from his position on the rail. “Stop trying to show off your writing skills already and let me get my work done,” grumbled Don. As bystanders panicked, running to and fro, this way and that, attempting to retreat from their war with nature into a secure building to rest, Don effortlessly strode slouching, his hands jammed in his dampened pockets, through the crowd. Then, the private eye was gone.

*Before you go, allow me to give you a few final words on Your Name*

It wasn’t the top-tier animation that made Hayao Miyazaki a household name. It was the combination of childhood nostalgia and an innocent sense of adventure in his films that elevated his success. It was the ability to include an array of social statements and dark elements to movies made for children without coming across as pretentious. More than anything else, it’s the feeling that you witnessed something special that established Miyazaki as a legend. Someday, I’ll be 90 years old, peeing on myself and losing my memory, but I’ll still recall the impact Miyazaki’s films had on me. Obviously, Your Name doesn’t contain that appeal. As soon as the anime community realizes this, they’ll move on from this film and idolize yet another time travel rom-com/tragedy with great animation and glaring flaws. It won’t be next week or next month but it will definitely be soon. When the time comes, there will be others like me, who scratch their heads in confusion and ask, “Wait, we’re doing this again?”

One of these days, MyAnimeList will get it right.

Plot:
The story starts fair enough. Our main character suffers from "Disney princess syndrome"; she's not satisfied with the surroundings she was born in and wants to see the world, that is so much bigger than what she knows. Luckily for her, magical realism is a thing in her world as well. Out of nowhere she gets the chance to live out her dreams by switching bodies with a boy from Tokyo every now and then. The boy, turns out to be the other main character. This sounds like the basic story, in which our lead learns, that "every place is beautiful, but home is still ... best" or that everybody has troubles in their life, no matter where they come from. The set up definetly has some potential, since the main characters parallel each other in an interesting way and they're pretty well characterized.
But that doesn't turn out to be the case with "Your Name". The writer was far more ambitious than to just recycle the classic body switch plot. About halfway the movie switches into a pretty convoluted romance story, that just doesn't work, because the whole second half is built around wanting to give the audience the "feels". Don't get me wrong, I like a good romance or a good tragedy as much as anyone else, but if it all feels as contrived and transparent as in this movie's case, I won't be able to jump on the feel train.
The climax was a pretty interesting idea, but was pretty inconsistently build up, where things worked out way too conveniently to be believable.

Characters:
I've already addressed it in the previous section, that I found the characterization of the characters pretty good. With the exception of the self-absorbed and ambitious father almost all felt pretty lively. Unfortunately characters can at time's be only as good as the plot allows them to be. This shows especially with the side characters, who at times just conveniently join into the plot, even if it doesn't make much sense. Same goes for our leads, they're pretty fun at first, but as soon as the plot starts becoming contrived and convoluted, I no longer found them as likeable.

Art:
The art and animation were pretty good, but it was pretty standard in terms of style.

Sound:
Just like the plot the sound was also heavy into making you feel stuff and to be fair it did resonate with me somewhat. Interestingly there were alot of pop songs instead of the more typical choice of instrumentals.

Plot: 50% (4/10)
Characters: 30% (6/10)
Art: 10% (8/10)
Soundtrack: 10% (8/10)

Score: 5/10

Expectation: 9.5
Reality: 5

After seeing many Makoto Shinkai works, this one didn't hit as hard. Character lacked depth and thr story felt bland. Of course animation was amazing, as you would expect, but the film was underwhelming at best.

The plot was pretty predictable and due to the nature of the phenomenom in the film, the romance was not as good as his other works. For the hype this had built up by the time I watched it, it really disappointed me to see the same-old plotline we've seen in every other one of his films. The ending was done well I must admit and combined ... with a good score, it pulled the right strings at the right time. However, this wasn't enough to carry the rest of the film.

Garden of words has much better character writing and challenges Your Name for animation quality.

When I saw the reviews and the rating that this anime has got, I was so intrigued. It's been rated much better than FMA:B or Gintama or HxH. Well, I was obviously hyped and unfortunately, this movie did NOT live up to its expectations.

Read on, but mild SPOILERS ahead:

---start of spoilers---
what irked me the most were the obvious GLARING mistakes in the plot. Both these kids exchange each others bodies and live as each other and go to each others school. Now, I dunno about you, but I remember writing dates in my notes EVERYDAY, along with the YEAR. I also always notice the year ... in my phone, not just the time and date of the month.
Besides, a friggin' meteor falling on a town and killing hundreds is NEWS that's gonna last friggin months along with the devastating video/photos, which is what happens after every calamity. It's ridiculous that none of the people recognised the damn scenery when that town should've been friggin' famous.
Pop culture, politicians, international events are just some of the things that change rapidly over 3, besides the softwares of your phone. Sigh.
---end of spoilers---

So in a nutshell, if you ignore the glaring inconsistencies and plot holes that really make this anime not for those who like a robust story, what you're left with is a cutesy romance story that has a mix of supernatural in it. Yea, doesn't sound spectacular now does it? I definitely wouldn't watch it a second time. The art and sound make the animation pretty good. But the story itself really fails to impress imho. The characters are also nothing special. There isn't much development of either of the two. I suppose it's silly to expect that from a two hour movie in the first place. I don't like stories that put a bit too much drama in it, and well, this one did overdo it a bit with the constant loss of memory for no reason (there was no reason why the guy had to lose memories of a meteor crash, cause it was independent of the girl anyway)
I really don't understand why this has been rated so highly. I guess the ratings will go down eventually.

Makoto Shinkai is without a doubt THE most visionary and diligent Japanese animation director as of 2016. A statement like this is pretty much just a matter-of-fact at this point in time. The man is extraordinarily talented and has a knack for creating fleshed out characters, with compelling story and dialogue to boot. With every subsequent release his films build more anticipation and more hype.

Kudos to him, kudos for all those who enjoy this movie and will continue to enjoy this film, but Makoto Shinkai needs to go back to the drawing board. It seems with every release he gets closer and closer to perfecting ... his formula and style, and Kimi No Na Wa (your name), sadly was the exception to that trend. Although Shinkai is tweaking and refining all of the elements of his craft, It just left me asking the question "for what purpose? " The plot was more drawn out, and more convoluted, and even more crammed into a running time that it could not fit than any of his previous films.

The movie was not bad by any means. Shinkai has come to a point in his career where making a bad film for him would be a challenge. But, this movie has no focus, no direction, and barely any thematic cohesion.

For the sake of brevity I will leave you with this. Miyazaki, Oshii, Takahata,Shinichiro Watanabe, Satoshi Kon, while all of there movies had flaws, these guys knew how to craft a compelling story! Which is what made their films so memorable in the first place.

Do yourself a favor and watch one of Shinkai's stronger installments like 5 cm per second or The Place Promised in Our Early Days( if you haven't already) to fully understand my perspective.

Mod Edit: this review may contain spoilers.

I have adjectives galore for this movie. For those experienced in Makoto Shinkai filmography, the art and animation are par for the course, but heads and shoulders above what is the next most visually beautiful animated movie you’ve seen.

Had I watched Kimi no na Wa for the scenery, I’d likely have considered it a passable film by Shinkai’s standards (because frankly, Garden of Words was just so much more aesthetically pleasing). However, like Garden of Words, Kimi no na Wa’s characterization and plot range from potently bad to practically non existent.

5 Centimeters per second had a particular air of ... nostalgia and loss to it that was palpable and painfully relatable. Kimi no na Wa tries to build up on the same premise, but with more of a linear plot, only to fail miserably.

First half was actually tolerable, it worked out just like your typical body switch romcom, which is sad considering the kind of budget and effort that must have went into making the beautiful backdrops come to life. Second half. Oh, the second half!

Whatever semblance of logic that the movie had up until that point was mercilessly crushed and flushed out of the toilet. And then the movie decided to shove a typical sci fi time travel cum disaster prevention plot down our throat, when I thought it couldn’t get any worse.

Sooo, the final product was a body switch slash time travel slash romance slash metaphysical slash philosophical plot that gets zero explanations throughout the movie. Actually, it does; body switch, time goes out of sync, weird dreams, disaster, kids save the day, turns out this has been in the family because comet.

TL;DR, ridiculously overrated pretentious hogwash. Crap like nothing ever was. Don’t waste your time if you’re looking for a movie that makes sense, but by all means watch it if you’ve seen Shinkai’s drop dead gorgeous art and want more of it.

Kimi No Na Wa is basically visual and audible chocolate to anybody interested in the elements of directing.

However like chocolate, it doesn't satisfy you at all and only gives you an amazing taste in your mouth for a brief period of time before eventually realize that you're still hungry, and you need something to satisfy you or you'll go hungry.

Kimi no Na Wa fails to give me a good reason to keep my suspension of disbelief because of the fact the plot was just so dreadful and dumb in my eyes, and not because of the fact they're switching bodies it's the reason why ... they switch bodies that just utterly baffles me because its just full of plot convenience and plot holes that makes me believe that the story was just an afterthought and not necessarily the core of the movie. And I don't want to discuss any more of my frustrations because that would mean I'd have to go into spoiler territory.

Now the only thing I thought was ok was the characters, Makoto Shinkai always does a great job establishing the atmosphere of each of the characters and does an amazing of contrasting the Urban and Rural lifestyles of the 2 character Taki and Mitsuha. And the way they react once they switch bodies was very charming and funny.

Overall the movie is impressive visually and musically however the failure for me to understand the emotional distraught that each of the characters faced because of the unbelievable plot conveniences and not to mention the very anti climatic ending was the reason I give this a 6/10

While the movie wasn't terrible, I was disappointed because I had high expectations for it. Most of the reviews seem to be overwhelming positive and it is ranked first so I guess most people enjoyed it. However for me, the story lacked alot while the art was outstanding (which is my opinion on most Makoto Shinkai's works).

STORY
I found the first half of the movie to be enjoyable and after the plot-twist, it kind of went downhill. The sci-fi element wasn't executed very well, alot of the times it felt as if happened all for plot convenience. The time travel and constant body-switching felt too ... much to me. I admit I was bored in the second half (which was pretty predictable). Also there is alot of inconsistencies which led to confusion.

ART AND SOUND
Art was amazing and sound was average (left no impression).

CHARACTERS
The two main characters aren't anything special. They are just your typical female and male lead who want to save everybody. There isn't too much to comment on them because there is nothing beyond them to analyse than what the show directly shows to you.

The female lead does get a little character development when she becomes more assertive to her father towards the end but honestly that's almost nothing. The minor characters were entertaining but also nothing special.

OVERALL
I think this movie is overrated. Yes, the art is amazing but in terms of plot is is average. For me, it left no impact or anything to think about or feel.

I went into this movie with expectations too high as it is highest grossing,#1 on MAL,but in the end it was nothing but disappointment.

The plot is in a total mess throughout the movie.It is like you have to switch off your brain while watching it otherwise you will be questioning about many things happening in the movie probably ruining the experience which happened with me. Both the Characters were mundane.The animation and soundtrack was amazing no doubt.

In the first half itself it was clear that this thing is overrated but it looked like it will be atmost an enjoyable slice of life.
But the ... second half was so bad that I totally lost interest in the movie and ended up waiting for this movie to finish.

So it was not surprising at this getting snubbed at Oscars and the director of the movie himself saying that movie was incomplete and unbalanced.

Story: 6/10
Character/Acting: 4/10
Art: 5/5
Sound: 4/5 (excluding the opening theme and mid-theme)
Enjoyment: 0/0 (Ridiculous - enjoyment is already implied in the above)
>Overall: 19/30 ~ 63% (63/100) ~ GPA Letter Grade = 'D'

I grade this film a D which is probably the fairest review you'll ever find on this website. If you'll humor me, I'd like to explain why.

I'm under the impression that the popular grading system here is fundamentally flawed; in that Art, Sound and 'Enjoyment' (wtf? this isn't even quantifiable) is equally as important as Story and Acting. Any professional/rational critic will tell you its just silly to allocate 50% of a film's ... success purely to sound and filmography as shown in this simple though exercise.

Is it not much easier to think of examples where good acting (characters) or Plot alone have created a film we would remember and love ... despite average music or filmography? But let us be honest now, sensational filmography and sound cannot create a masterpiece from mediocre plot. I think the essence of why quite unoriginal films like this can place #1 is because of this imbalance and dishonest grading system. Anyone who gave this film anything higher than a 7 has done so because
1. They don't care for artistic integrity or originality and aren't afraid to vote from emotional relief without justification. The 'Enjoyment' grading perfectly demonstrates how critically flawed grades are. What even the point of rating Story, Art, Sound and Character all of which can be quantified through stimulus ... but 'enjoyment' cannot and appeals only to mood which distorts your ratings accuracy. Enjoyment and Overall make one another redundant, and in this unspecific, but mandatory rating excess ... the entire rating becomes warped.
2. They haven't seen any one of the many highly identical films/characters.
Since when did the standard for top #1 fall so low that recycled characters and not too distant plots can win awards. I'd implore you to explore the tag-links within the Genre categorisation. Does a piano/violin and guitar music piece accompanied by above-standard (to TV series) art - really make it a recipient of such a high creative honor?
3. They think music and a few distracting moments of sweeping art (but mainly impressive editing) is just as/if not more important to plot.

Even if just one person reads this, I will feel graced. I wouldn't be here today if it weren't for the power of rational and constructive criticism that constantly cleanse me of my stubborn ways.

With love,
Willowboy.

Join my wander, to a yonder.
In search of the meaning from mystery & wonder ...
And when tragedy finds us, and breaks our bodies
We'll find peace in one mind.

With all of the praise this movie has gotten it's no surprise that it is fairly well done movie. Unlike some other movies that are all style and no substance this does have good writing as well as good art, but it isn't exactly a masterpiece either.

The first half of the movie establishes the two main characters and their relationship with each other and because of the way it's set up explaining the second half would have to lead to spoilers. The story is done well and despite the short run time it does manage to tell a complete story. One hindrance the duration does ... impose is the lack of time to explain the two fantastic phenomena that the plot revolves around. The full story was unexpected given the beginning, but it would have been better as an ecchi comedy otherwise.

As one would expect from a Makoto Shinkai film the art is amazing. The characters look beautiful, the backgrounds are detailed, and generally everything looks amazing. The detail of the scenery actually is important to the plot, but even if it weren't it would be just as spectacular.

The voice actors do a very good job, which is important since the characters will switch roles every so often. The music is nice to listen to, but it isn't always all that fitting with the situation and sometimes it feels like there's a random AMV in the middle of the anime without much reason.

The two main characters are both quite interesting. It's fun to see how they react to the situations they get into while in the other person's shoes. There is a line from one character that brings into question just how common their problem is and why no one else seems to know about it, but unfortunately the anime isn't long enough to give us answer to this.

Although not everything makes complete sense, you don't have to turn your brain off to enjoy this. The second half is rather chaotic so the plot itself gives you enough to think about that you might not even notice the plot holes. This also isn't something that only a niche audience can enjoy so there's a pretty good chance you will like it. The incredible art adds to the enjoyment.

Overall it's a pretty good film. The art was amazing and the rest didn't feel too far behind it. There were some problems, but they are all relatively easy to overlook. With all things considered it was a good watch.

It is one of those typical cases of the internet, they are talking very well, it should be great, sure will be great, 2 hours later ... ???????
How so this is greatly overestimatedBeginning of the story very complicated you take to get the essence, only after a few tens of minutes watching you can distinguish between Mitsuha and Taki, the story would have a legal outcome, I thought they could overcome the barrier of time, but I was sure That it would not be like this, had high expectations, I was very distressed watching this movie, I must say because they take so long to ... meet, it's a movie you have few minutes or hours to give an end to the story, now have an end like The one in which the character meets her and ends at the apex of the "flag" I think it was slutty, well I can say I liked the movie, but not that I was satisfied can watch and enjoy the movie, I even recommend however if you have anxiety That would not be a good idea...
I must also emphasize that this is my own opinion, now I must "take my hat" to the design of the characters, the art and also the soundtrack that are great
Certainly worth it in aspects ...
Well I did not get much benefit from having high expectations for people's feedback, but I think it was a bit overrated, but if you're looking for something to watch with romance and drama and a good choice, because I'm not much of a fan of romance, but History holds you, makes you accompany every moment in ecstasy and also agunstiar with waiting for the damn encounter!

Story: Only a few tens of minutes for you to understand, and also know who is in the body of who

Art: Just wonderful

Sound: Voices of the actors have been well chosen, the soundtrack is contagious

Character: They do not seem so natural, the co-stars can play a better role than the protagonist. It came to be somewhat forced such changes, without any explanation
There were times when I asked where I was.
*where I am?*

Enjoyment: I watched with a friend who has little knowledge, I had to stop the movie at all times to try to explain what I understood of the scene, there were moments that I was lost.
Also because I did not understand what was happening at the moment *SIGH*

Overall:In my opinion just O V E R R A T E D

I was recently in Japan and did a theater marathon of this film and Koe no Katachi (the latter of which I really enjoyed).

I would say that leaving Kimi no Na wa gave me the same feeling I had when I left the theater for Avatar in 2009. "That was ok. Really pretty but the writing is kind of bad." Meanwhile everyone jumps on it as the greatest achievement in filmmaking and it's forgotten a few years later.

While I'm being pretty harsh, I actually do think Kimi no Na wa has a lot of cultural value. Its style, tone, music ... choice and story feels distinctly 2016. I feel like we will look at this movie thirty years from now in the same way that we look back on Back to The Future feeling like an 80s film. So it's not to say that this movie wasn't enjoyable or has no cultural importance, it's that the writing and characters are bad. And to me, that's the defining characteristic of what makes great film.

Story and Characters - I have tagged the beginning and end of the spoiler sections.

The story in Kimi no Na Wa is not at all straightforward. The plot is needlessly convoluted. The main character is a girl who lives in Lake Suwa, Japan (which I recently stayed at and recommend visiting!) and wishes she lived in the city instead of the country. Her family owns a shrine, and she is stuck doing these ancient traditions.

The main guy is a guy who lives in Tokyo. He is painfully average and has almost zero character development. We know only of what his social life is, and not really anything significant about him.

One day out of the blue, the main characters switch bodies, and realize that they switch back and forth every other day. They begin to alter each other's lives. The boy starts acting feminine and vice versa.

The direction is VERY fast during these scenes, as it's all treated like a music video. However the visual storytelling is effective at relaying what's going on. They have a lot of fun making these scenes, the boy gropes himself every morning as the girl and acts the opposite of the girl, and the girl makes an older co-worker fall in love with him.

The movie then enters its second half, which is where the mess comes in. It's hard to be critical of this movie without explaining spoilers, but let me throw out a warning here.

--SPOILERS BEGIN--

A comet comes down and destroys lake Suwa three years before the timeline event where the girl switches body with the guy. For some reason she jumps ahead three years and spends two weeks swapping bodies without thinking of checking the year on a calendar, or finding his contact information so she can meet him when she gets her body back every other day. Honestly, the first thing that I would do in this situation is find out who's life I'm invading, but whatever, it's fun I guess.

The main guy goes on a quest after two weeks to find her and learns that all his body switching happpened three years ago, and that a meteor wiped out the town. He has to go on a long road trip journey in order to discover the crater took everything out. You would think that if a small town's inhabitants got slaughtered by a meteorite a mere three hour train ride away from Tokyo, that it would be a widely known national tragedy for years to come. But the main character has to figure it out by going to the country and asking about a town that people tell him doesn't exist, because it was blown up. He doesn't figure it out until he sees the damn crater. How does this make any sense?

Then he goes and finds some magic sake that the girls placed in a shrine cave, and he drinks the sake, which makes him learn her backstory as a child. Which isn't exactly character development, but at least we learn more about the girl character.

Then they have a phantom conversation that makes no sense and is only there for plot convenience. Lots of crying, music videos, and epic camera spinning occurs. This scene is a melodramatic headache for me.

Finally the main character's decide to go back and spend their last day saving the town in the girl's body. She convinces her friends to help evacuate the town because "a meteor will kill us all, I saw it in a dream, trust me guys." So they trust her.

Her guy friend steals his dad's dynamite and blows up a power station to get the town to evacuate. I wish I had that much faith in my friend's dreams. Maybe I don't actually.

The meteor falls and the town's people are saved. Yay.




--SPOILERS END--

I'm not really sure what the theme is, but what bothers me is that the film throws plot convenience in with supernatural occurrences with no explanation other than that it will push the story where they want it to go. These things happen in plenty of movies, however, we are not given proper time to connect with the supernatural happenings. It's already ridiculous that a meteor takes out a town, let alone the part where people are switching bodies every other day. Why every other day? Why two whole weeks before the meteor happens? Why the main character? Why is his timeline three years later? Why three years specifically? What does all of this have to do with the big picture of the movie? What is the theme of the film? Like all of Shinkai's works, thematics, poetics and symbolism are thrown all over the place, but if the overall theme is as weak as "Save the people in the town and fall in love.", I don't really see what the point is.

If you boil Kimi no Na Wa down to its core, it's an incredibly simple movie. The town is in trouble, a guy from the future tries to save it and a girl. So why is it dowsing me in artistry and theme? Koe no Katachi had thematics that I could write a massive analysis on. There was a strong purpose to everything, and it was an excellent film documenting the human condition, which is the objective of most good film. Kimi no Na Wa tries to be deep but in the end it's just masking its shallowness. It's fun to watch, but boy is it flawed.

Story - 5
Character - Strong 6



Art/Sound -

The art is breathtaking, as always with Shinkai's films. The animation is fluid and the visual direction is always interesting. Attention to detail is all throughout the film, and atmosphere is HEAVY in each scene. Quiet scenes are very tranquil, and loud scenes are booming with color and brightness. The only complaint I have is the damn 3D spinning shots around the crater. That was just way too over the top dramatic, to the point where it was corny.

The music is well scored, and a big draw for the Japanese audience is the many songs by the band RADWIMPS. This movie may as well have been a visual album for RADWIMPS, because they released so many hits. I was in Japan for a month and was hearing all five or so songs they did for this movie EVERYWHERE. Rural cafes, and big cities. Everywhere was playing the music. It's a memorable soundtrack, and they place the songs like music videos during the film. There is an opening that plays, and a credits track, but there are actual music video like breaks during the drama of the film. It's interesting to say the least, but certainly a strength of the movie.
Art - Strong 9
Sound - Strong 9


Overall - I rate the film with a strong 6 or a light 7. In many ways it's above average, but in the writing department I would say it is full of holes and below average. There's nothing worse to me than a super dramatic story where I don't connect with the characters and don't feel the emotions they're trying to throw at me. I'm glad other people are enjoying it, but it is very flawed in many areas.

I've seen plenty of anime after people hyping them up to no end and it's nothing new for me to watch a title that doesn't live up to the hype but this movie goes beyond that. Shortly after hitting the theaters it became a huge success, most grossing anime movie of all time and number one on MAL (doesn't say much but still, it illustrates the hype around it). I even saw people who went to theaters over and over again to rewatch it up to 10 times or even more! I have friends that bought the special editions and all that.
Now I didn't ... go into it expecting to be blown away, neither did I do in to be a smug asshole to tell everyone how bad the thing they love is but I did expect more than a very mediocre mix of drama and romcom.

Story: Kimi no na wa is a touching take about a city boy and a village girl swapping bodies with silly shenanigans that arise from it and, uhh... time travel... and comet strike disaster subplot that's just there for some reason. It's also about family, friendship, nature and about 5 or 4 other things that can be used to very loosely describe what is actually a very pointless movie.
I gotta say, this Shinkai guy? Amazing art, his writing? Not so much. He can sorta draft an interesting concept that has a lot of potential but I never saw him properly flesh out any story of his so what he ends up with is a pretty movie with interesting concept but instead of actual plot it's just a string of emotionally manipulative moments that through a combination of appropriate music, beautiful visuals and characters just bland enough to feel bare minimum of sympathy.
That's the case here. Mitsuha is a village girl who wants to live in a big city, she's a daughter of her village's mayor and uhh... That's about it. She's boring there is nothing to her. Taki or whatever is even more bland, he's a pretty generic Tokyo boy, has a short temper, wants to be an architect and that is again it, he's dull and evern the "short temper" part doesn't even matter a single bit outside of a few comedic bits and one irrelevant scene near the end.
Do I need to point out why such bland characters are a problem in this kind of movie? Pretty much all good romance has to have interesting chemistry, clash of personalities or just something to make you care about characters and their relationship. Then again I'm not even sure this qualifies for romance in the end cause I've seen movies with throwaway romantic subplots with more romance. Here they just meet through MAGIC, swap bodies for a while and when it stops they are somehow in love with each other and can't live with one another, spending their lives passively searching their other half. It's terrible and I think I said enough to justify my position so let's get to the other part.
Drama! It sorta just starts maybe hour into the movie when body swap stops so our main guy, unable to accept that he's no longer a girl few times a week, does his best to find Matsuha but when he does we learn something terrible! That's when nonsensical time travel is introduced, I swear to god Shinkai must have a fetish for putting some arbitrary distance between his characters but never actually exploring it. We also get to the comet strike garbage and averting damage is what the rest of the movie is spent on. It's spent on saving the village and characters you don't really care about and resolving the timeline conflict in a way devoid of any tension or thinking. But at least we get a very flaccid happy ending, hurray?

Art: ten outta ten, this is the first Shinkai movie that's more than just beautiful scenery and pretty characters. This time around there's actually animation around every corner and his use of 3D only gets better with every movie so it looks pretty smooth and natural aside from one shot where camera pans all the way from Tokyo to a remote village. It's an extremely tough thing to do in both 2D and 3D so even though there are minor faults visible here and there it's still very visually impressive. Don't expect mad sakuga, it's not an action movie but for what it is the movie is still absolutely gorgeous.

Audio: not much to say, a lot of the soundtrack is Radwimps living up to their name. VA is just about standard, I saw someone praise va for making SUBTLE changes when characters are body swapped but it's as fine and subtle as blunt force trauma. If you think that's anything noteworthy watch literally any body swap movie.

Funfactor: you might think I hated the movie but I didn't. I do think it's about as close to a masterpiece as Stephen Hawking to being a ballet dancer but it's still an entertaining casual watch of you can look at it without analysing any aspect of it.

This is my first review, so bear with me as I try to flesh out how I feel about this movie in simple terms.

To start off, I went into this movie with very high expectations. Perhaps it is because I heard so many great reviews about it. Everyone I knew, even friends who generally don't watch anime, ranted and raved about how this was one of the best films they'd ever seen. This exact same thing happened to me when I listened to everyone's reviews of Frozen-- I finished the movie feeling disappointed. Your Name did not fail to leave a bitter taste in my ... mouth by the end. I think it has taught me to take opinions with a grain of salt. It's always better to go in with low expectations and leave satisfied than the other way around.

STORY: The story was, to put it frankly, boring. It wasn't anything special, and I honestly expected it to be amazing with the way everyone was going on about it. Substance is one of the most important parts of a story, and Your Name truly lacked in that department. Maybe it's just the cynic in me that is completely tired of all these rehashed love stories, but I cannot be convinced that the plot was anything new or exciting.

ART: I've seen Shinkai's work throughout the years, and the scenery was always the most well done. At least the movie had this much going for it. The animation of the people has improved vastly from some of his earlier works, too. I was pleasantly surprised by this. The art isn't the most impressive I've ever seen, although I do congratulate Shinkai on setting a trend for using a stupid amount of light sources and gradients. You cannot deny that many animations have tried to look like Your Name since its success.

SOUND: The sound was lovely. I can't argue with RADWIMPS being an obviously good choice for any sort of slice of life setting. Their music fit well with the theme of the movie.

CHARACTER: Haha. This got me even more than the story, in the sense that the poor character writing was a major part of why the story was so bad. I don't have much to say about this other than he was a boy, she was a girl. Can I make it any more obvious?

Enjoyment: I had a really hard time enjoying this film because of the lack of good story line and decent character development. I didn't find it fun, or exciting, or even sad (as hard as they tried to force me to be). I only wished for it to be over soon so I could go do something more productive with my time.

In conclusion, I don't know y'all lol. I'm old and tired of seeing the same 5 heterosexual love stories portrayed in the media as "compelling" and "inspiring." They're not. They're boring. No amount of gradient laden art could save me from feeling so disconnected from the characters, and the story in general. I can't say I hated it, because I know there are many people who would fight me on that, but I didn't like it either? I suppose I just don't care. It was overrated, and not my cup of tea. If someone were to ask me if I recommended it, I would answer simply with, "it's worth watching if you go in with no expectations."

The movie is mediocre, I can appreciate the animation and the art direction, and we can also say that the way the story rolls is pretty interesting, the characters meet each other by switching body's and living the life of each other... but how exactly am I suppose to believe that something like that can evolve into a romantic connection? They had been doing that to endure the situation they're involve in, there is not a plausible way to think that such a thing can happen in those circumstances, you can feel worried about your survival partner, but you can't feel the desire to be ... her/his boyfriend/girlfriend, at least not when you are unable to treat with that person face to face.

The time travel is another plot hole, both kids were set on different dates and none of them were able to figure that out (despite they spent like 1 or 2 weeks dealing with the problem)

The whole problem was solved thanks to the magic of the plot armor, since literally everything got solved by a miracle that came out of nowhere, and both kids were able to save the whole town because of that.

5/10 Just another disappointment.

Before i start talking about what i liked and disliked about this movie, i just want to point out that this movie is the highest rated anime movie on this website. I did not know this before watching this movie, and if somebody asked me if it deserves that title i would say no.

Now that't not to say there isn't good in this movie, Kimi no Na wa (your name) has some incredible art, some very good music, and it honestly kept me wondering how it would end and wrap up what happened.
That being said ... some of these character moments often prioritise melodrama which ... in turn makes them look completely idiotic because of the situation they are in. (i will explain later)

Story: 5/10 (Mediocre) (Spoilers)
This is probably my lowest part of the movie, it loses all logic for drama multiple times, a love story that is much too fast and forced. It honestly hit me like a wrecking ball how they instantly fall in love ... they haven't met at this point, they have their own lives, their own goal and she even sets him up on a date but instantly flips to interest and romantic attraction.

But even if you ignore the forced love story ... how does the ending make sense? Taki acted like a complete moron for dramatic tension and instead of writing a message to himself or even the girls name who he "loves" at this point, he decided it was a higher priority to repeatedly shout her name for dramatic effect when he knows he is going to forget who she is in literal seconds... what do you know, moments later he remembers "oh yeah ... i will forget the girl i love time to write her name! wait ... who is she again?"

I honestly rolled my eyes. This moment along with her "forced comedy" reactions to meeting him the first time. Joking about how he touched her boobs when they swapped bodies and how hes "just a pervert!" really destroyed this anime for me. In my opinion it wasn't "cute and awkward flirtatious jokes" it was silly anime trope nonsense.

(Spoilers) Now ... i have multiple other things that don't make sense, like how she somehow convinced her dad to listen to her when he is the mayor and knows there isn't a forest fire. But he somehow listened to her advice and evacuated everyone to the school after rejecting her advice for the whole movie and outright stopped their attempt to earlier evacuate everyone.
Or maybe how they are three years apart but when he dated her school papers nobody questioned the wrong dates? There would be discrepancies between dates, maybe it was Wednesday for her but years later it would be Friday for him.

But the biggest issue is the ending, they lose their memories and pass each other on public transport. But have a "feeling" they know each other. They then tease walking away again only to stop and declare to each other "i think i know you!" yes the ending to this movie is "love conquers all" even complete loss of memory due to time travel.
(spoilers over)

Art: 9/10 Great
Really really great art, there is even a scene where the style swaps to something more painterly and it looks incredible. Vivid, colourful and eye-catching!

Sound: 8/10 Very good. Apart from a little lacklustre voice acting, the soundtrack was great and has multiple "anime style opening songs" which honestly were also very good.

Character: 6/10 Fair.
This one was tough, i debated between mediocre and fair for a while, but i settled on fair. I think the word "fair" sums the character development and motivations perfectly. It does just enough, and yes they often act absent minded for the purpose of drama and yes it forced a rushed love interest in a girl and guy they have never actually met. But for most of the movie they are fine, that being said some of the side characters are quite likeable, like the girl who works in the restaurant with Taki.

Enjoyment: 4/10 Decent.
It's decent, and i can say that if you just want a cute movie with decent drama, great art and fantastic music. This could easily be an 8 maybe 9/10 for you. As long as you don't expect the creators to focus on logic and reason over drama. But for me this wasn't so enjoyable, i found myself rolling my eyes too much and jumping on characters stupidity in the moment.

Overall Kimi No Na Wa (your name) is a 5/10 for me. (Mediocre) I do understand how this movie is rated so highly, but does it deserve that high rating? Honestly, no.

Shinkai Makoto’s last movie, Kotonoha no Niwa (2013), was praised for its gorgeous animation, but criticized for being what many felt was “too short”. I beg to differ, but you all went out and said your piece, so Shinkai is back with Kimi no Na Wa, a movie that’s over ninety minutes long and really should have been a lot shorter. Its length ought to be manageable, but the poor romance plot makes an otherwise cute story a chore to slog through.

The basic gist of the film is that Mitsuha, the main female lead, lives in a small village with her grandmother and sisters. However, ... she’s not all that content with her boring life, and wishes her reincarnation would be a handsome boy living in Tokyo. The next day she wakes up seemingly in aforementioned handsome Tokyo boy’s body – it seems as if Mitsuha and Taki, the boy, are randomly switching bodies. Time travel shenanigans later ensue. It should be pretty interesting – but unfortunately, it’s not. I’ll attempt to explain why in a bit.

Let’s start with the good parts, though. The animation is, as usual for a Shinkai film, very good. It’s fluid, crisp, clean. There are several nature shots that are so realistic it seems like they might be actual pictures. You get the gist – typical Shinkai fare by now, but we’re amazed every time regardless. I’ll say just one more thing about this: Kotonoha no Niwa’s animation was far more impressive to me.

Okay, I think that’s it. Now to the middling and bad.

The movie’s soundtrack is decent, though not entirely memorable. At least I enjoyed the vocal tracks this time around. The character designs are pretty typical. I personally consider them boring. The characterization is average at best – none of the characters really stick out or display any defining tics or traits. We don’t come to know them very well, apart from maybe Mitsuha. All the characters are pretty normal human beings, but as a result, they’re a little boring to follow.

The movie’s plot is good, if not completely original, but made unpalatable by what is arguably the worst part of the movie: the romance. It is, in a nutshell, terrible. There’s no chemistry between the characters. There’s not even an indication that the two might have a crush on each other. Heck, I’m inclined to say that Kimi no Na Wa’s romance portion is completely and utterly unnecessary. It feels tacked on, as if Shinkai just realized in the last thirty minutes that he really needs to get the two main leads together at the end…because reasons. Sure, you don’t necessarily fall in love because of tangible reasons, but it was difficult for me to believe the characters were in love by the end of the movie.

The blunt truth is that Kimi no Na Wa would have been a lot more interesting – and the romance a bit more relatable – if the movie were about how Mitsuha and Taki adjusted to switching bodies. But the movie isn’t about that: instead, we’re treated to a montage and some narration of how Mitsuha and Taki coped with the situation. There’s no finesse about it. It’s just a half-explored gimmick to make the movie seem cooler, and to make it longer. The last thirty to forty minutes are almost an entirely different film. It would have been a lot better to keep the two concepts in the movie separate, since Shinkai did not succeed in melding them together, in my opinion. In the end, the length of the movie and its unexplored, half-developed concepts really, really hurt the movie.

Kimi no Na Wa is one of the most overrated anime movie films of recent years. It is most certainly not Shinkai Makoto’s greatest work, and does not deserve to be called a magnum opus. People who call it original or breathtaking have clearly never seen the 2006 movie The Lake House – Hollywood, yes, and a remake of a Korean film, but that doesn’t change the fact that it’s got a much better and more feasible romance in it. There’s no romance in Kimi no Na Wa, and as such, it fails as a romance movie. It also fails as a drama movie, since I did not feel connected to the characters. Overall, it’s saved from complete mediocrity by a serviceable OST and some pretty animation.

Genuinely don't understand the hype. It was very pretty, but the story was the most generic done-to-death romance story in which nothing really happened and continued to not really happen and then it was over after a really cheesy "Can I ask... your name!?!?" line.

I honestly couldn't tell you a single thing about any of the characters personalities because they had none, other than teehee boy gropes his own boobies.

The art style was very good and the sound design also was. I didn't really care for the pop songs in OST for the most part though, but that is a personal taste thing. You can ... tell a lot of production value went into these both, shame about the unintuitive story.

This is my first anime review ever, well "here we go," as Mario yells. Anyway apparently this is hailed by this website and IMDB as the greatest anime ever based on average numerical scores given by users. It is also the highest grossing anime film of all time raking in about $360 million in box office totals. Well I can say I did not find this film amazing, or even that good to be honest, it was merely above average. There are many significant flaws that prevent this film from being considered great in my opinion and or "magical" that so many people hype it ... up to be.

First, the story. It's pretty simple a boy and a girl are able to switch bodies with each other and the way they handle some situations is rather comical. This was displayed in the beginning and these were the best parts of the movie how the boy and girl adapt to changes in their body switches and environmental changes. Then apparently, the boy and girl want to meet together but the boy finds out through the book of records after he visits the town (itomori) that the town was blown apart by a comet. The big issue I have with the story is there is no sense of conflict or tension at all. SPOILERS AHEAD!! The boy confesses his love to the girl by writing on her hand only the problem is the boy is 3 years behind the girl in the timeline hence he cannot communicate with her (via phone or in person). The part I don't understand is how he is able to actually meet her though at some point if they are "supposed" to be three years apart. I bet this made people all teary eyed but all I felt was my butt itching because the movie's story was that forgettable and plain. Honestly I didn't feel any emotional attachment to the story or characters which is another big issue.

The characters were extremely flat and lifeless. Apparently I'm supposed to feel for them. But they have no interesting qualities; the boy is your regular city high schooler and the girl is just some country side girl. They don't do anything particularly exciting, heroic, dangerous, or even what I would consider funny (accept adapting to some changes in body switching). The side characters aren’t much better either. Oderu was the only somewhat interesting characters but she didn’t have that much screen time. Were there even antagonists in the story? What, is the comet supposed to be the antagonist? The two main characters are the most plain and average people you could ever find on any given day nothing movie worthy about them at all really. I don't want to see a movie about that. I go watch movies and anime to see danger, excitement, fear of the unknown, drama, comedy. But here the characters display none of that. The only good character in this movie was the comet which didn't even have a single line of dialogue. I wished the comet just killed everybody so the movie would end quicker. This movie also had the most anticlimactic and dry ending on the planet like really? Come on now.

An area where this movie truly shines is the art and animation of the movie. Makoto Shinkai paid great attention to detail and the backgrounds are truly beautiful to look at with almost every detail drawn to sublime perfection. Trees and leaves have little droplets of water glistening on them, mountain ranges with proper bumps and curvatures, and characters that actually look like humans instead of freakish caricatures. Also the animation was good as well. Characters show facial changes when speaking and smooth transitions in their movement, and fluid transitions of moving objects. It was very well drawn for the most part of it and high quality art was implemented in the movie.

The music was ok nothing really that great just some basic J-pop by the band Radwimps which sounds like any typical anime OP. The music didn't convey any emotional impact on the viewer either just like the story and bland characters. Anime in which the music conveys an emotional impact on the viewers and builds upon the greatness of the anime is Perfect Blue. Perfect Blue has a very cheery opening with rather deep lyrics reminiscent of 90s J-pop but it sets a somewhat melancholic tone to the movie plus the background music during most of the movies scary parts sends chills down my spine with its ominous ambience. Ninja Scroll directed by Yoshiaki Kawajiri would not be as good or great if not for the epic background music attached to the very violent and brutal fight scenes. The music in those films elevates those films to levels of greatness rather than just good or above average. Music in movies can really change the entire mood of how a scene is presented, but here it doesn’t really do anything. The music here just doesn't leave any impact on the viewer and it's as cookie cutter as it comes not bad just plain and boring. The music here cannot hold a finger to any Disney movies in terms of music but that’s a completely different rant for now.

Overall, I didn't outright hate this movie but I didn't like it that much either. The story and pacing weren't good and even though this movie was only an hour and forty six minutes long it felt much longer due to the unconvincing story and dry characters. This movie is like vanilla ice cream it's edible but is it the be-all and end-all of food? Not a chance. What I enjoyed about this movie were the great visuals. Everything looked stunning and was pretty to look at. The issue is though none of it had much substance. Makoto Shinkai basically created a visual movie (maybe drawing tutorial). The visuals are beautiful and nice to look at but is there really any substance behind it? Makoto Shinkai is definitely no Miyazaki, Kawajiri, or Satoshi Kon (RIP). Good artwork but he needs to focus on making interesting characters for a story like this to work which he didn't. Maybe I came in with too high expectations? That is possible but for such a highly rated and acclaimed film I just didn’t think it was all that special or exciting.