The Garden of Sinners - Chapter 3: ever cry, never life. (Remaining Sense of Pain)

WOW. They actually get better?

Remaining Sense of Pain is the third movie released in the Kara no Kyoukai series and the second chronologically, taking place after Shiki goes to the hospital in Murder Speculation and before she gets her first doll arm which we see in Overlooking View.

Instead of the spirit angle of the first movie or the straight crime drama of the second, we have a combo: a hunt for a supernaturally-gifted killer.


Right off the bat, the movie surpasses both predecessors with timely editing and a notable backing track to help emphasize the sequence of events. Unfortunately, those events turn out to be rape.

Thankfully, unlike many less conscionable anime creators, no attempt is made to portray the scene as erotic, merely abusive, which necessarily complements the plot. The plot being that this ongoing abuse is the catalyst for the same woman's vengeful murder spree which will be the central focus for the rest of the story.

Kokutou finds the same woman one day as she appears to be suffering stomach pains. He does his best to take care of her before she disappears.

We learn pretty quick that Shiki works alongside Kokutou for the exposition fairy who appears to run some sort of underground operation dealing with supernatural phenomenon. The most recent case is that of a series of murders in which the victims limbs are all found horribly twisted, dislocated, and broken. Shiki establishes at this point that her visual power not only allows her to see ghosts, but it allows her to sense and locate related supernatural phenomenon.

During a sideplot, Kokutou attempts to locate a missing person who turns out to be one of the gang members from the opening scene in hiding from the woman they raped who seems to be on a vengeful killing spree.

Shiki's power (as well as Shiki in general) is well contrasted with the woman's by emphasizing that their respective powers are bloodline related, and while Shiki's bloodline was essentially bred to maximize the power of her eyes, the woman's power was stunted and concealed with narcotics which incidentally also dulled her sense of pain.

You see where the title comes in now?

Many correlations are made similar to Overlooking View's horrible riddlespeak about sight, but this time it's about pain and it actually makes sense.

Many different pieces of information are analyzed by the characters to determine the cause of the woman's mysterious stomach pain which incites her increasingly dangerous killing spree, whether it's real, whether it's psychosomatic, or whether it's really the knife wound it's suggested she received.

It's all interesting, and the ultimate truth actually explains a great deal when the characters finally discover it, however the manner in which this information is offered to us is somewhat cheapened by the fact that much of it simply dumped on us at the end in a single car ride. It would have been much more interesting to have these clues better spread throughout the movie as part of the investigation.

To be fair though, the movie is well-paced at under 60 minutes, so my real issue is probably more accurately that the dead ambiance just makes the movie feel slow. If the same editing and sound that was used in the beginning was retained throughout, it would better keep me engaged.


Another strike against the movie would have to be the first showdown between Shiki and the woman. You're expecting a fight then and there, but Shiki seems to just change her mind and walk away only to attack her much later. It doesn't make sense in the moment, and it doesn't really make sense after having seen the rest of it, either. It's just anticlimactic.

Beyond that... some of the dialog doesn't work. Some of it sounds vaguely like something out of Overlooking View, and by the end of the movie, we're supposed to believe that the woman's extremely limited interactions with Kokutou warranted some degree of love. This is by and large pretty limited, though. Most of the movie's dialog is pretty coherent and digestable, even if they aren't giving you all the information you need to right away.

Also there's some medically questionable claims here and there, but none so bad that they ruin any scenes (at least not for me).

Regardless, if you've noticed my relative lack of spoilers, it's because I think it's a movie that's worth surprising you.

And I'm pleasantly surprised to say that for a Kara no Kyoukai movie.