Wednesday, November 4, 2015

[Anime Review] When Marnie Was There


“I dreamt we walked together along the shore. 
We made satisfying small talk and laughed. 
This morning I found sand in my shoe and a seashell in my pocket. 
Was I only dreaming?” 
-Maya Angelou

There likely wasn't many people who didn't feel at least a little apprehensive as legendary director Hayao Miyzaki let loose on the reigns of Studio Ghibli, reigns that he had been steering for so many years. It honestly didn't really matter that Ghibli had other more-than-capable directors such as Isao Takahata, the studio was losing a vastly important factor that had been there since its very conception, and many anime fans were wondering what was next for Ghibli as Miyazaki's last cinematic endeavor: The Wind Rises, played its credits down the screen.
     I can't say that Studio Ghibli's latest film: When Marnie Was There, quite settles my doubts about the studio's progression into the uncertain future, in fact, the movie is such a ball out of left field that it could signify a change in the common tonal direction for Ghibli, which of course could be unnerving for some. We'll get into that. But I think that at the very least, When Marnie Was There reinforces that Ghibli still has extremely talented people on staff, and not all of that "Ghibli magic" directly came from Miyazaki. Apparently it's a systemic thing for the studio to create delightful movies such as this. Oh, I'm doing that thing where I get way ahead of myself with the points I want to make. Let me take a step back.

     Hello people of "The Wired" my name is Quan, may your days be sunny and wonderful, and welcome to a brand new anime review, in fact, my very first review of an anime movie. Today, we take a look at When Marnie Was There, Studio Ghibli's latest film. Let's get started.

When Marnie Was There was released in July 2014, directed by Hiromasa Yonebayashi, a relatively up-and-coming director for Ghibli, as one of the protégés that were being trained up as the studio prepared for Miyazaki's retirement. The only other film directed by Yonebayashi was The Secret World of Arrietty, which I haven't even seen so I can't exactly vouch for, but judging by how great the directing was for When Marnie Was There, I think we can look forward to fantastic works by him in the future. The screenplay was written by Yonebayashi himself, Masashi Andou(who worked almost completely as a key animator and character design up until now), and Keiko Niwa, who has done many different scrips for Ghibl films before, including From Up On Poppy Hill and Tales from Earthsea. Okay, I think that covers everything of importance. Let's get into the story.

Story

12yr-old Anna hasn't had a good life. Her existence is empty. She sketches drawings in her notebook. She goes to school. She returns home. Plagued by severe asthma attacks and a total lack of self-esteem, Anna finds herself bitter and alone, lashing out at the classmates who briefly attempted to befriend her and her step-parents who she currently could not feel more alienated from. Becoming increasingly worried over Anna's mental state and the severity of her asthma attacks, Anna's step-mother Yoriko sends her off from the hustle and bustle of their home of Sapporo to live for the summer in the countryside with her aunt and uncle, hoping that the fresh air and small country town will bring Anna focus and happiness in her chaotic life.
Anna, on the train to hopefully a new life. 

     Anna finds little to dampen the burning isolation she feels from other people while living with her aunt and uncle, until she stumbles upon The Marsh House, an enigmatic mansion falling into disrepair, which Anna finds herself inexplicably drawn to. There, Anna meets Marnie, a girl that seems at first to be a polar opposite to Anna, as she takes delight from life and other people, relishing her lavish lifestyle of parties and dancing provided by her rich-as-hell parents. The two girls connect and quickly become unlikely friends(almost too quickly, actually), and seemingly, for the first time in her life, Anna has found a true confidant. But as she starts to learn more about Marnie, Anna quickly begins to wonder if all is quite how Marnie tells it, and whether her new friend is hiding something from her. And of course, it doesn't help that everything about Marnie is mysterious as hell, to the way she seems to appear and disappear in the blink of an eye, or whenever Anna says goodbye to Marnie, Anna wakes up in a strange place without remembering how she got there. As revelations around Marnie's identity slowly begin to come into view, Anna herself must start to question what is truly important to her, as she discovers the little wonders of the people and the world around her that just maybe, could make life worth living.

If that sounded a little heavy to you for a Ghibli film, get used to it, When Marnie Was There is likely one of the most thematically dense films Ghibli have done for awhile, from the very serious arc of depression that our main character goes through, to the surprisingly gripping and intense mystery that surrounds Marnie's whole existence. In that way, the film almost seems more like a supernatural mystery than anything, as it slowly unwinds the setting and characters into one single payoff; very much not the same cloth as the fantasy adventure or romance that Studio Ghibli usually bring to the table. Also just as a side-note, yeah, I'm not sure if I just misunderstood the marketing message of this film prior to release, but going into the film, I was honestly expecting a full-fledged romance between Anna and Marnie that was peppered with supernatural elements(because hell, anime has been depicting lesbian relationships since Sailor Moon all the way back in 1992, a.k.a, before I was even born), but I would encourage you not to approach the film with this mindset if you were. Sure, there might be an argument that the first half is somewhat romantic, but as the supernatural mystery takes over later on, it is revealed that Anna and Marnie's relationship is not like that at all, so much so that I wonder why the first half of the movie seemed to so strongly hint at romantic development. I mean sure, maybe I was just misconceiving the dialouge because I really wanted to see how well Ghibli would handle a lesbian relationship, but when the girls are saying things like "I love you more than any girl I've ever known" to one-another, can you really blame me for thinking it was going that direction?
     Anyway, I've spent far too much time on that, so now let's go into the inner-working of the movie itself. As I've already stated, the whole thing plays out more like a supernatural mystery, which spends the first half mostly fleshing out Anna's character, before leaping right into the whole Marnie mystery later on. To get right to it, it surprised me just how well the whole mystery aspect of the film worked, it got me excited and guessing for what was coming next, and left so many great little hints and clues throughout that kept my brain thinking, trying to figure out the big revelation before the film actually revealed it. But mystery isn't all the film has to offer. I mentioned before that When Marnie Was There is much heavier thematically-wise than most other Ghibli films, and this is because it is excellent at depicting the complexity and subtly of human emotion. I'll get more specific when I get to the characters portion of this review, but regardless of their role in the plot, I never felt like any of the actions the characters took, no matter how dramatic they were, weren't always were justified in the context of the plot. To put it simply, the film feels exceedingly human, that's genuine with its actions and messages about life, and for how much of a crazy medium anime can be sometimes, what with the ninja girls, giant robots and talking cats, that's amazingly enlivening. Needless to say, when you pair the engaging mystery of the film and the background of human psychology to drive it, I really was ready to add When Marnie Was There to near the top of the list of my favorite Studio Ghibli films. All it now needed to do it wrap up the mystery concisely and awesomely, and give an emotional pay-off so desperately needed for the characters. ...Yeah, for how much I like this film... here comes the asterisk.
Was it a dream? I saw deep red.

When it comes to sticking the landing, I feel When Marnie Was There was unable, but my reasoning is a little complicated, so bear with me. I watched this film with my whole family, because you know, that's really the only way to watch a Ghibli film, and I think the possible answers to the mystery that we came up with while watching were way better than the answer the film actually had in store. Okay, so don't get me wrong, the final revelation makes complete sense, mostly, if you're paying attention, but that's not my problem with it. I'll get a little more into this at the end of this review, but with the build-up it was having, I can't help but feel that When Marnie Was There sort of played it safe at the end there. Because... let's see... how to word it.  The film ended in a way that if you have seen any Studio Ghibli film, you can probably guess the way the film handles its very final scenes. But... it didn't need to.
On the left: Marnie, on the right: Anna.

Characters

The only characters that really matter here are Marnie and Anna, so I'll just quickly gloss over the supporting cast. The supporting cast, that is mostly made up of Anna's estranged family and classmates, aren't important in terms of their characterization as much as they are important to develop the main cast. They exist only to show the changing mind-set of the film's leads, rarely having any particularly interesting traits or development of their own. Which is fine I guess, but judging from the moral that the film decides to wave in the air at the end, a stronger supporting cast really would have helped reinforced it. But When Marnie Was There really doesn't have it, in fact, only one other character really matters besides the main duo in the film's second and third acts, and before you ask, that character is just another tool for Anna's development.
     Next is Marnie, the mysterious resident of The Marsh House. Lively and enthusiastic, Marnie is the one to initially pull Anna out of her shell of self-deprecation, which honestly, when you look at the film's thematic stitching, is sort of a brilliant move. Without spoiling too much, Marnie for the most part represents an opposite mind-set to the same situation, and as that trait mostly takes up her screen-time and thus is fleshed out, playing partly into Anna's development, the inherent tragedy of her character really doesn't seem that forced or melodramatic. Ultimately, I don't think Marnie is quite as good a character as our other main heroine, but she still is one of the more interesting characters to come out of Ghibli films recently, whose main characters' one-dimensional viewpoints could be rather taxing sometimes.
     Now, it's time to talk about Anna, and holy Haruhi Suzumiya director Yonebayashi, thank you for Anna, who is possibly the best part of this entire movie. I always have pushed that anime needs more asshole protagonists in general, because I love me some asshole protagonists. Now, most people hate asshole protagonists because they're assholes, but in a medium where "pure waifu" female leads are too common, whenever I see a female protagonist that doesn't have an innocent personality, archetypal qualities, or eyes that are the approximate size of dinner plates, I find it exceedingly refreshing. Anna completely owns the first half of the movie(before the mystery takes primary focus that is), her character capturing perfectly the actions of a lost, bitter girl who doesn't know what to do or what she wants. A lesser movie would make Anna a really hard character to like, however, her characterization is so freakin' on point that it becomes impossible to dislike her just on the account of how well written she is. From her mannerisms, to her inner monologues, to the actions that lack them, you begin to understand that no matter how much the classmates that Anna has lashed out at dislike her, she dislikes herself more, and after that becomes apparent, it becomes hard not to cheer for her as she struggles to find her own answer. Besides from maybe a few others, Anna is by far my favorite Ghibli protagonist, and it was the desire to see how her character would play out that kept me going as the plot slowly started to move towards something I really hoped it would avoid.
Why is it so beautiful?
Presentation & Sound

Sweet Yuki Nagato in an Evangelion, I honestly thought I had seen the peak of Ghibli animation when I saw The Wind Rises for the first time, but low and behold, Ghibli animators find a way to push what I think they are capable of. This is probably the most impressed I've been with an anime's artwork since Nagi no Asukara(which I'm still amazed by how great it looked since it was a 26-episode show), and for good reason. Everything is at its absolute best, from the moving parts to the amount of expression shown by the character models, but without a doubt, what really shines is the absolutely beautiful backgrounds. I lost count how many times I simply wanted to pause the movie, take a screenshot of whatever background was on the screen and hang it up in my bedroom; it really looks that good most of the time, with astonishing detail and vividness of colors that really punctuate the setting and giving it more personality, which is nice, because all things considered, the art-style really does nothing more than provide ambiance instead of thematic clues most of the time. But that's a nit-pick if I've ever said one. That was really me grasping for straws, the animation is honestly nearly perfect.
     As with most Ghibli films, the soundtrack of When Marnie Was There is one mostly for atmosphere with one exception. This time around the music was composed by Takatsugu Muramatsu, who honestly has really done nothing worth mentioning, and it shows. Nothing really stands out honestly, the OST is mostly made of slow instrumental pieces that help the relaxed and peaceful atmosphere. I'd say it's just kind of okay, if it wasn't for one specific song that plays during the end of the movie: Fine On The Outside by artist Priscilla Ahn. It's rare for a song to encapsulate the piece of media it belongs to, and even rarer for it to do it well, and even rarer for it to be as emotionally potent as this. Maybe it has something to do with how the entire song is in English and I can understand everything that's being said, but I really find this song simple, yet very emotionally heavy with its delivery... much like the film itself.

Fine On The Outside

Verdict

I really don't know what to think sometimes about When Marnie Was There. Normally, something like this would be one of favorite Ghibli movies, but the strange circumstances of its story honestly leave me at a loss of which 1-digit number I should attach to it at the end of this review. This is one of the few times where I've really doubted whether a rating system is even necessary for reviewing anime, because this is a rare occasion where my expectations of what the film should have done right stray from what the movie actually did right. And that's a weird position to be in, especially when I need to attach a number to it. 
The cycle breaks.

     The film is undoubtedly strong, but I find myself thinking about how much better it could have been. I acknowledge that it's good, but here I'm stuck wondering about how easily it could have been great. And I don't know what to think. Maybe the problem here is my expectations. Maybe it was wrong of me to expect that the film would play out differently than every other film Ghibli have been producing for decades. Maybe... a lot of things. But this is my experience after all, and as muddled and confused as it may be, it's still my own. I fully expect my opinion on this film to be wavering from time to time down my anime career, but I think this is something I can safely say. Despite all the strengths the film does have, and despite the way it is able to wrap up all questions relatively competently, it also showed me a hint of something else. A different kind of Ghibli film, that could still emulate the feelings that these films usually do while still being exciting, complex, and hell, maybe even profound. I didn't get that. I got a quality movie, but I didn't get that. I got intrigue, but not true immersion. I got great characters, but not a substantial moral to tie their arcs together. To wrap this up, while I got a good movie... I suppose I just expected a little more.

Final Verdict: 7.5/10

P.S: Though then again... that doll.



Recommended Anime:
Porco Rosso

If you want a return to more traditional Ghibli movies, I can recommend this over-looked gem. It's funny, touching, and greatly under-appreciated in the Ghibli line-up. Also head this way for a pig-protagonist. 


Hibike! Euphonium

I wasn't really sure what to recommend second, so here's a show that both looks just as gorgeous as this film and deals with the somewhat similiar emotional turmoil of its characters. It's not particularly similiar to When Marnie Was There, but with a second season of Hibike announced, now is as good a time as any to watch this thing. 

Unfortunately, When Marnie is There is not available to legally stream anywhere, but you can pick it up on DVD for, if you're lucky, 20$ or less. Happy hunting.

Goodbye for now guys.


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