A Moment of Silence

This month is a little different than previous ones as instead of an update of how i progressed; the requirement was to write a review on whatever you wanted to as long as it related to your quest. For my review I decided to do a movie: 映画 聲の形 ('Koe no Katachi'; meaning literally 'The Shape of Voice: The Movie'). In English the movie is called "A Silent Voice.

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Why did you review trash and not something else?

Trash? Oh. Anime. I did not choose this only because I wanted to; I had some other 'real' reasons. Firstly, as I am learning the Japanese language I thought I should do something that used the language. That narrowed it down to books, movies, television shows, and music (this is all I could think of that included language, there probably are others). After that, I felt I should be able to make some connections between Japanese and English, so that once again narrowed it down to shows and movies. Finally I decided to use a movie because a television series, in my opinion, would be too long and hard to review (at the very least harder than a movie). I chose this movie in particular because it includes a lot of writing. Why? I think the title of the movie and the picture before you click on this post explains it all.

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Was it any good?

(Let me just say right now that this is NOT action, it is a drama with a hint of romance, so if that genre doesn't appeal to you then you probably will not like it.) I can say with confidence that this is one of the best movies I have ever watched, and no; this is not my bias getting the best of me here. I am a person that would rarely call something a masterpiece because there usually is something I dislike, something that throws me off and makes me think "If only they didn't include ___ it would be much better." I have nothing to say along those lines regarding this movie because it is a masterpiece. Everything in this movie was just flat out amazing. The drawings in every single frame were done beautifully, every single character formally introduced was unique and each played an important role in the story, and finally the plot: it tears you to shreds on the inside (I'm not good enough at English to explain how I feel so I guess that will do). When everything seems to be looking up for the characters something manages to happen and it ends up worse than before. However, even through all this the movie still manages to tackle a real world issue in a very realistic way.

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What is it about?

Ishida Shouya is a 18 year old loner who seeks redemption. He seeks redemption from his tainted past. His past where during elementary school him and his group of friends tormented a nearly deaf girl (named Nishimiya Shouko) on a daily basis. The school eventually got notified about a potential bullying incident and all eyes fall on Shouya to which he tells the truth about it being a group effort and turns towards his friends for confirmation; however, they all hang him out to dry and they deny any involvement with the bullying leading him and his mother to be the only ones to be punished. After this incident he is then outcasted from his friend group and eventually he becomes hated by all his classmates to which he blocks out everyone else other than his direct family. Soon after, Shouko leaves the school and Shouya becomes very guilty for his actions and starts to hate life. The movie is his story on how he attempts to atone for his wrongdoings and potentially find meaning in his life again.

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What is your Conclusion?

As a whole I give this movie a 9/10, it is not a 10/10 because as I rarely call things masterpieces, I never give things a perfect score (nor do i give them the worst score so that's one thing). This movie about a teenager seeking for redemption almost brought me to tears and as someone who has never cried in a movie/TV show (at least from what I remember) that has to say something about the movie, whether you like anime or not.

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Some final notes for this post

That was my review about 'A Silent Voice', I hope I was able to at least intrigue you enough to look at the trailer of the movie. Even if you are not interested in it from my review it would mean a lot to me if you watched a little bit of it. Next month i'll be back with an actual update on my progress! さようなら (Sayounara)!