It rains everyday in Japan, even in the days which supposed to be summer. Hodaka ran away from his house to Japan, intended to find a job that doesn’t need minimum age requirement. On the cruise from his hometown to Tokyo, he was helped by Suga, owner of a small publishing company, from sudden rainstorm. Felt difficult to save money in Tokyo, after failed to get proper job, Hodaka applied for a job at Suga’s office. There he met Suga’s assistant, Natsumi and was assigned to write an article about “Sunshine Girl“, a girl who is believed to have a mysterious power to stop rain and bring out sunshine. After doing some researches, Hodaka accidentally helped a girl that gave him free dinner before. The girl later revealed herself as the true Sunshine Girl, named Hina. She is former waitress who only lives with her young brother, Nagi. Found an opportunity to raise a lot of money, Hodaka persuade Hina and Nagi to run a “rain stopping” business for those who need clear skies. But, the more often Hina uses her power, the more she gets closer with a tragic fate.
I really amazed with the animation done by Makoto Shinkai. The illustration he done seems alive and very realistic. I love the way he put the smallest details on his work such as animating the boys soaked by heavy rain, or when he illustrated Hodaka’s injury caused by fence wires. For those who already watched Your Name, Makoto’s work is the expectedly excellent one. Those details almost made me ignore the story and just enjoy the pictures treated by him. Luckily the love story delivered about Hodaka and Hina is really interesting to follow.
Weathering With You shows us how everybody in Japan miss sunlight after long days of rain. In a sunny day the event they held can be more crowded. Their children also will enjoy playing outside. It’s funny to see the children see this phenomenon as an opportunity to both collect money and make the others happy. This longing rain phenomenon also elaborated fairly from both scientific and urban legend point of view. In the end, we’re also explained how climate and human changed Japan territory in the past, of course still related with the fate of the local citizens at the end of the movie. As the trailer said, this is the story about how Hodaka and Hina changed the shape of the world. With that point, which Hodaka justified the fate isn’t due to Hina’s reappearance, this movie success in brought its “environmental message”.
Compared to Your Name, this movie seemed more interesting and thrilling because it features another conflict towards Hodaka and Hina. Hodaka ran away from his hometown and illegal to work, made him a fugitive. The same thing happened on Hina and her brother who are found out to live without their parent. Tried to escape from polices’ chasing, their runaway scenes give thrilling tone to the movie, especially when Hina revealed her upcoming fate to Hodaka and made Hodaka wished for them to be always together. However the conflict left a plot hole since the movie didn’t explored Hodaka’s problem with his parent, which is supposed to be the tip of Hodaka’s story. The same thing also occurred when we’re talking about “the gun” which made the scene of first meeting between Hodaka and Hina too dramatic to be true. Comparing again, this movie success again in delivering sweet teenagers’ romance, but according to the storyline, Your Name is still the more impressive one.
Talking about “fan service”, Makoto gives special appearances of the protagonists from Your Name. However their appearance seemed misplaced and might make the fans reconsider their relationship after the ending scene of Your Name. Those special appearances make me no longer wonder why we should watch this movie right after watching Your Name. Yeah, welcome to the miraculous Makoto Shinkai’s universe.
I do love this another Makoto’s masterpiece. His animation work is near perfection. However, some plots of his story would be more reasonable if are expanded more. It made me revised my score from 8.5 into 8 of 10 score for this movie.
Notes of Hobbies 