I got to know of Shinkai Makoto’s work only just at after the second half of this year. Out of all his works, the one which which I first watched was Byousoku 5 cm. It was through Windbell that I got to know of such a great film and animation director, and I have never regretted every single second spent watching it.
However, I regretted not being exposed to Shinkai Makoto’s work before Byousoku 5 cm.
So, after Byousoku 5cm, I watched Hoshi no Koe, as well as Kumo no Mukou, Yakusoku no Basho. They were awesome. However, it was just unfortunate that I was not able to find the OVA Kanojo to Kanojo no Neko. I would like to see that, despite it being merely a 5 minutes video.
All his productions I have watched so far have one thing in common. Their theme is mainly based on separation. In Hoshi no Koe, Mikako and Noboru are separated by space and time. In Kumo no Mukou, Yakusoku no Basho, the tower was the cause of separation between Sayuri and Hiroki and Takuya. And finally, in Byousoku 5cm, there are 2 instances of distance between the relationship of 2 couples, namely Takaki and Akari, and Takaki and Kanae.
The theme that Shinkai Makoto decided to include in his work has made the characters realistic. Separation occurs in real life, and everyone has experienced it at least once in a lifetime. Hence, people are able to feel for the characters. Maybe not everyone, but at least I did. While watching, I often put myself into the shoes of the character to try and understand how the character is feeling at that point of time. And many times,I felt like I could really understand the feelings. The sadness, the fear of losing each other, the desperation of trying to prevent separation despite being powerless.
I think out of all the 3 , the separation which had the greatest impact on me was the distance displayed in Hoshi no Koe. In the other 2 films, the distance was more of a psychological distance, as all the characters were still on Earth and in the same country, just in different places. However, in Hoshi no Koe, the distance was just as physical as it was psychological, and it was widening as time went by.
There was a chance for the characters in the other 2 films to meet and patch the distance. However, Hoshi no Koe is based in space,where Mikako could just die any moment and never be able to return to Earth to meet Noboru, and Noboru would not know until 8 years later.
One might argue that Hoshi no Koe is not at all realistic. It is indeed a blown-up version of human separation and distance. But, it still was able to bring out perfectly the despair that the couple felt when they themselves knew the distance between them was growing day by day.
Real life separation would probably be as tragic as the separations in Byousoku 5cm. After all, it is the most realistic out of the 3 films.
There should also be one more point which is common in Shinkai Makoto’s films. Technology is developed, supposedly to help close the distance between people. Yet, in the films, it seems that instead of it’s intended purpose, technology creates and widens the distance instead.
Would technology actually do harm instead of the benefit which it is supposed to provide? In my opinion, technology can only close the physical distance, but for the psychological distance, only humans have to power to close it.
That being said,I’m looking forward to the next film of Shinkai Matoko.
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