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This was a short film so it gets a short review. The story was excellent - minimal but still very emotional. This is the whole "soldier-overseas" story ramped up to 11, with the soldier in question (a 15 year-old girl named Mikako) piloting a fighting robot in outer space against some sort of alien scum. This fairly clichéd set-up, combined with the amateurish animation, doesn't do the film many favours. (But hey, the whole film was made by one guy and a computer. By that standard, this film is damned impressive.)
However, the real focus isn't the war - it's the relationship between Mikako and Noboru, the guy she left behind on earth. The only way they communicate is by texting each other. However, each text message takes longer and longer to reach as Mikako ends up travelling light-years away. One message takes a year to send, later on another message takes eight years to send. While Mikako stays a 15-year-old girl in space, Noboru ages regularly.
Voices is about as tragic a movie as I've watched in the past few weeks, and the ending was a seriously sad one. It managed to pack a lot into its brief 30-minute run-time and I highly recommend it to everyone.
VOICES OF A DISTANT STAR
(Matoro Shinkai, 2002)
(Matoro Shinkai, 2002)
This was a short film so it gets a short review. The story was excellent - minimal but still very emotional. This is the whole "soldier-overseas" story ramped up to 11, with the soldier in question (a 15 year-old girl named Mikako) piloting a fighting robot in outer space against some sort of alien scum. This fairly clichéd set-up, combined with the amateurish animation, doesn't do the film many favours. (But hey, the whole film was made by one guy and a computer. By that standard, this film is damned impressive.)
However, the real focus isn't the war - it's the relationship between Mikako and Noboru, the guy she left behind on earth. The only way they communicate is by texting each other. However, each text message takes longer and longer to reach as Mikako ends up travelling light-years away. One message takes a year to send, later on another message takes eight years to send. While Mikako stays a 15-year-old girl in space, Noboru ages regularly.
Voices is about as tragic a movie as I've watched in the past few weeks, and the ending was a seriously sad one. It managed to pack a lot into its brief 30-minute run-time and I highly recommend it to everyone.