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| This did not work for me at all. An almost complete failure. And I liked Hosoda Mamoru well enough. The plot is the biggest problem. Stuff just keeps happening. There were so many points where characters acted in a way that didn't make sense or in a highly-stylized manner so that they didn't feel like real people. I still don't understand why Belle was so obsessed with the Beast. It picks up so many moving pieces and then trips and comically crashes down the stairs. Online anonymity, fame and going viral, fandom and haters, real self vs. persona, self-esteem, social dynamics, self-expression and creativity, grief, broken family relationships, domestic abuse, helping victims of abuse... None of them worked, either on its own or in combination with others. The worldbuilding wasn't convincing at all. I don't think Hosoda has a good grasp on how the internet works and how people behave online. I say this when I'm also an old man on the internet in this day and age... I was constantly having questions about how this metaverse thing works and why users were acting a certain way. The Beauty and the Beast angle was basically pointless. And I don't understand why Hosoda felt the need to invoke the Disney film so strongly in terms of visuals. Suzu is a likable enough character, but felt pretty basic. The emotional climax of Suzu standing up to the abusive father was unbelievable, unsatisfying, naive and almost dangerous. That's not how you should approach things, and that's not how things would go down... I want to say the visuals and the music were great at least, but that wouldn't be quite true. The backgrounds and characters in the real world were beautiful, but the virtual world looked pretty dull despite its technical brilliance, and the avatars were overdesigned and often ugly. The songs were vaguely pleasant but bland. Possibly because I wasn't buying the emotions behind them at all. I really liked the quiet scenes in the real world where characters just talked and interacted with each other. The awkward confession scene between Kamishin and Ruka was wonderful, and so was Suzu texting her dad on the bus and tearing up in real-time. I thought Mirai was a little rough, but I do think I need to watch that one again. But Belle was just torturous and embarrassing. And now I seriously worry for Scarlet, which seems to be another retelling of a well-known classic in a fancy coat. |
| Watched 04 Jan 2022 After an interesting if wonky step forward with Mirai no Mirai, Hosoda has decided to revert to his old stuff, trying to cram his precedent movies, typical "anime-ish" fair, AND strong nostalgia for The Beauty and the Beast (©Disney, not the fairy tale of course) into his latest output, giving us a film more "appealing" in simple ways than "Mirai" . When you add to that recipe cute or peppy jap.pop songs (some might say obnoxious) and classic teen lesson, you can easily imagine how queasy the result is. In all appearances a simple isolated teenager fantasy drama, it manages to spin into social drama awkwardly in its final moments while making its way to it through an accumulation of easy ways out. The CGI is usually ugly, sometimes okay and intelligently exploited mostly in the internet world, but its overabundance during crowded scenes doesn't make the most appealing pictures of the overloaded virtual world. Score: 6/10 (-1 if you are not desensitized to "anime-ish" stuff) Enjoyment: 3/5 Hosoda, the remix. Garuru Cannon™ included. PS: you even get a "remake" of Disney's famous ballroom scene, that will make you question if the mastery of computer imagery has really progressed in those last thirty years. |
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