You are going to read a film analysis based article where I will talk about different aspects of an animated film named ‘The Girl Who Leapt Through Time’. At first, I will apprise readers some basic information about the film then I will elaborate my own analysis. So, why delay? Let’s begin.
Table of Contents
Primary Information
- The Girl Who Leapt Through Time is a romantic science fiction animation. Madhouse produced it. Mamoru Hosoda directed this film and Satoko Okudera wrote the script.
- It is an interesting film. The animated film is a loose sequel to 1967. The girl who leapt gains the power of time travel and repeatedly relives the same day in a time loop.
- It released in Japan on July 15, 2006 and received many positive reviews.
- It is a time travel film. The girl who leapt won numerous awards, including the Japan Academy Prize for Animation of the Year. This film was produced by Kadokawa Pictures U.S and the English version was licensed too.
- It won the Animation Grand Award, given to the year’s most entertaining animated film, at the prestigious sixty-first Annual Mainichi Film Awards. The film received the Grand Prize in the animation division at the 2006 Japan Media Arts Festival. It won the Special Distinction for Feature Film at France’s thirty-first Annecy International Animated Film Festival on June 16, 2007.
- The film grossed approximately ¥300 million in Japan and ₩664,964,500 in South Korea.
Own Film Analysis of The Girl Who Leapt Through Time
This is a wonderful animated film. The girl who leapt tells a story and the story centred on 3 friends. The tomboyish and clumsy Makoto Konono (voiced by Riisa Naka), and two hunks Chiaki Mamiya (Takuya Ishida) and Kousuke Tsuda (Mitsutaka Itakura).
The plot focused on a friendship that formed after school at the baseball court. They spend quality time there talking about typical teenage stuffs. Things start to change however when Makoto by accident gets the power to time travel, and in her own ditzy way, uses her newfound abilities for “good” – directly for herself, or in some Emma like moments, to influence the outcome of relationships for her friends and play matchmaker.
The underlying theme in this movie was “the importance of living the moment”. Film’s protagonist is given the power to leap back into time to correct her mistakes, only to realize later that the short-term gains only lead to greater losses that followed. The story was extremely well-constructed to teach the lesson of embracing things the way they are, and never run from confrontations because once that moment is gone, you’ll never get it back.
The plot is quite warm and engaging. Cute moments and crazy Van Gogh-inspired time-travel fantasy visuals are charming. The film captures the conflicted emotions of first love and the embarrassment of being a teen with real sensitivity. The animated film’s main characters are entirely credible and likable. Time travel has rarely seemed so joyous in an animation.
Some Sort of Cons about this Animated Film
There are some lacks in editing which I have noticed while watching this film. For instance, The characters have no facial features at all. There is absolutely no shading at all. The time travel sequence is a 20 second computer generated visual effect which was little boring at the same time.
Moreover, this movie is one big slow plot hole. Story telling progress and plot development is too slow that some people may find it irritating. Another irritating element of this film is irritating screeching background sound. the noise is so loud and irritating it’s hard to pay attention to what the characters are talking about. Here sound editing was needed.
Final Outline
Overall, this Japanese animation is good and watch-worthy at least once. I would like to recommend this movie, especially who are a fan of high school teenage romance. Otherwise, skip it.
Though there are same lack too in this movie but the story is cleverly written the animation is stunning and it does have a certain charm to it that even someone like myself who isn’t the biggest fan of the genre can appreciate.
In my opinion, the blend of romantic animation along with science fiction elements were really entertaining. This was enough for the movie to be very good. I have enjoyed the movie. Hopefully, you may enjoy too 🙂
