Dull

No, not at all.

You do realise that it isn't all one story? It's a number of brief stand-alone episodes, gently comic tales of an ordinary family's daily life; each episode ends with a well-known classical haiku, an amusing little twist that relates these everyday events to famous gems of traditional verse.

I hesitate to invoke The Simpsons, because the adventures of Homer, Marge and family are far more dramatic and surreal, but if each episode ended with a verse from Walt Whitman or Emily Dickinson that commented on the action, that would be something like a parallel.

How was it dull? You are confused and have no taste.

I can understand how it could be dull to an average viewer who have been surrounded by overly dramatic Hollywood flocks these days. The fact is, this movie can be dull if you ignore the little subtletys and expressionism each characters exhibits. The catch phrase "less is more.." is more profound in this little artistic film than todays cartoon episodes. The illustration was able to convey a deeper landscape into ones mind. You can imagine more in the extra white space with minimal artistic guidance. As a result it can engage the audience, but I guess not with everyone.

No, I loved it. Thought it was very watchable all the way through. Exactly my kind of thing. Very poignant stuff.


on battleship hill, i hear the wind
http://tinyurl.com/3vo6eqh

There seem to be a number of criteria required to liking this film, such as liking the kind of humour found in the short comic strips, being engaged by a normal family's every day life even when you've already got your own family's life to deal with, and having some insight into the Japanese language such that the jokes are clearer. Personally I fulfilled none of these criteria, wondered what all the fuss was about and really couldn't wait for it to end. Given the weight of favour in the "This film is amazing" camp I figured I'd try and help stand up for the other side. Now there'll be some flak with "you cretin" etc. and "you obviously know nothing about..." etc., but I quite liked Tokyo Story and any number of other slow paced Japanese and Korean films about family life. Point is that at least there was something interesting or poignant in those. Nothing of any note happens in this at all and the humour for the uninitiated is so "gentle" it's gone missing. In fact many people could go and recreate this whole film themselves. Clear litter from a park? Easy. Forget stuff on the way to go somewhere? No problem. Get parcels delivered? All the time. For me at least that is never a good thing in something you watch as a change from real life. Yes sometimes I will enjoy films where there are familiar situations because I can empathise more but this is about as mundane as it gets. If the film had been 20 mins long perhaps I wouldn't have bothered writing all of this but there needs to be a balance of opinion out there so at least people can know what they're getting themselves into for good or ill. Why did I rent this and watch it you may ask? Studio Ghibli fan I'll admit and not necessarily the target audience, but the high rating across the demographic board? I still don't understand.

just doesn't suit for a movie, I cant stand with this!

I really enjoyed it, as a loosely tied together set of skits. The situations were very recognizable, even to a Westerner, and at the same time showing of the "peculiarities" of Japanese culture.

Seriously? This movie was effing hilarious!