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Kantaro · Posted: Sun Mar 17, 2013 3:23 pm Post subject: The Wolf Children: Ame & Yuki

Have any of you seen this? It's a Japanese animated movie released last year in Japan to almost universal acclaim. It won best animated picture at the Japanese version of the Oscars, as well as at a number of other film festivals.

Funimation in the US has already gotten the rights so they will be releasing an English dubbed version of it at some point in the US but as of now there are versions with English subtitles.

It's about a 19 year old woman who meets a man sneaking in to her college for lessons. She likes him, and offers to share her textbooks with him. After a period of time, he reveals his secret to her; he is a wolf man. Not a traditional werewolf, but a man who has the last of the Japanese wolves' blood running through his veins. He is the only one of his kind left, as all the Japanese wolves went extinct 100 years ago.

He is able to transform into a wolf at will, and does so in front of the woman (named Hana) in the hopes that she would accept him for who he is. She does, and he moves into her tiny apartment with her, and together they conceive a girl named Yuki, and a year later a boy named Ame.

Shortly after Ame is born, the father goes missing. He went out hunting for food and was accidentally killed in the process. Now Hana must raise her two small wolf children by herself, and face all the problems that go with it.

Her neighbors complain because Ame always cries, but her neighbors also complain that she has pets, because they can hear howling. When Yuki eats some silca gel one night and gets sick, Hana can't decide whether to bring her to the children's hospital or the vet.

The movie is about the next 10 years, how the wolf children grow up and how they try, fail and succeed at fitting in to society. It's their eternal struggle, and the constant need to answer the question their mother asked them when they were young: Do you want to be humans or wolves?

I cannot express how beautiful this movie is. In terms of artwork it's traditional 2D hand drawn animation and when you watch it you realize what you're missing when you watch a 3D animated movie, even the good ones from Pixar. It's absolutely gorgeous. The pace of the movie is intentionally a bit slow, to let you take in everything around you as it happens. The story is heartbreakingly sad, bitterly angry, hysterically funny, adorably cute and everything in between. It is a story told by a master class storyteller, and if you have feelings you do not want to miss it.

There is of course a somewhat furry aspect to it, as the father and both his children can (and do) turn into wolves, but it's not really about that as much as it is about the difficulties surrounding it, the challenges of a sort of mystical ability in an exceedingly normal setting.

It is a beautiful, heart-wrenching movie that IMO nobody should miss. If you get the opportunity, see it.

ScottyDM · Posted: Mon Mar 18, 2013 12:05 am Post subject:

Dude, you changed your name?

Errr, guess you wanted comments about the movie.

Looks interesting, and nice idea. The focus of the story is what I'm trying to express when explaining the difference between anthro-fic and sci-fi, or antho-fic and paranormal. It's a personal story about the characters' journey. Of course anthro-fic (furry-fic, if you prefer) isn't a "real" genre, so we're stuck with sci-fi, fantasy, or paranormal (for shape-shifters).

Scotty

Kantaro · Posted: Mon Mar 18, 2013 12:37 am Post subject:

Yeah, and this movie is almost real enough to be considered non-fiction, if it weren't made up. And had kids who can turn into wolves in it. But seriously, aside from that it's preeminently realistic, it has a very, very real tone and quality to it.

That's why I said it's a master class in storytelling; the story is first and foremost throughout the whole thing. The wolf changing blends and flows into the story so well that it's not designed to shock you or amaze you, it's simply a part of their otherwise relatively normal lives.

It just sort of shows you what some very real difficulties might be if you had children who could turn into wolves. Like this, for example.

Kantaro · Posted: Mon Mar 18, 2013 12:42 am Post subject:

Sorry, and one more - this is what I meant about the beauty of traditional hand drawn 2D animation. They took their time, and drew many many frames for even the simplest scenes. look at how the wind affects everything, look at his ears. You just don't see that in 3D CGI, it just doesn't look as natural as that.

ScottyDM · Posted: Mon Mar 18, 2013 1:19 am Post subject:

Elhaam · Registered User Joined: 19 May 2013 Posts: 17

I watched a subbed version of this online recently. I'm glad I did. Of course it was sad, being about a single parent struggling to make end's meet, but I easily warm up to that kind of story (like The Pursuit of Happyness or The Secret of NIMH). The supernatural elements made it mysterious and interesting.

ScottyDM · Posted: Tue May 21, 2013 7:54 pm Post subject:

bkatt500 · Registered User Joined: 25 May 2013 Posts: 4

I'll look around for it, definitely.

That's interesting about the backgrounds... I always thought it would be easier in cg since you could use, say, ten different trees which all look very different at different angles and generate them randomly and at different angles. It might not hold up to obsessive inspection, but it wouldn't be noticeable for most viewers I would think.