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BOT's Top 100 Films of the 2010s: The Countdown | List complete

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38 minutes ago, RealLyre said:

Haven’t seen all of them but Grave blew me away. If it’s indeed the worst one, the others must be god tier 

Biggest problem with the movie is that the reason the ending happens at all is because of the main character himself and not the war. I liked the film enough (mostly for the first act and the animation) but it's pretty emotionally manipulative and a garbage anti-war film. Was bored for most of it too. And this is coming from someone who LOVES Takahata's other films and placed Kaguya as the 4th best film of the 2010s.

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33 minutes ago, lorddemaxus said:

Biggest problem with the movie is that the reason the ending happens at all is because of the main character himself and not the war. I liked the film enough (mostly for the first act and the animation) but it's pretty emotionally manipulative and a garbage anti-war film. Was bored for most of it too. And this is coming from someone who LOVES Takahata's other films and placed Kaguya as the 4th best film of the 2010s.

I think this was the point of the movie lol, you're not supposed to like the main character, you could only feel pity for him

 

Spoiler

the whole thing is an allegory to how Japan lost the war with so many casualties, the main theme is people refusing to let go of their pride and the consequences of that, like how Japan was too prideful to surrender until later in the war (after the atomic bombs & Soviet invasion which cost them thousands of their civilians dead), the main character refused to let go of his pride and go back to the aunt house  and thus got his sister sick & died.

 

 

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26 minutes ago, lorddemaxus said:

Biggest problem with the movie is that the reason the ending happens at all is because of the main character himself and not the war. I liked the film enough (mostly for the first act and the animation) but it's pretty emotionally manipulative and a garbage anti-war film. Was bored for most of it too. And this is coming from someone who LOVES Takahata's other films and placed Kaguya as the 4th best film of the 2010s.

Without going into major spoilers I feel most of this is just pushing a western judgement on characters with Japanese sensibilities. A lot of the film is to do with the Japanese wanting to save face which makes them seem stubborn. Also the film is based off a somewhat autobiographical short story so they couldn’t really change reality to make it have a happy ending. 

 

I personally have Grave of the Fireflies in my top 5 if not top 3 Ghibli films. I’d also recommend Spirited Away, My Neighbour Totoro, Princess Mononoke and Only Yesterday as must watch Ghibli films. 

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10 minutes ago, RealLyre said:

I think this was the point of the movie lol, you're not supposed to like the main character, you could only feel pity for him

 

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Yeah, if the entire point of the movie is to pity a character whose pride caused what happened in the end, it's not really worth anyone's time. That's just misery-porn.

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7 minutes ago, Jamiem said:

Without going into major spoilers I feel most of this is just pushing a western judgement on characters with Japanese sensibilities. A lot of the film is to do with the Japanese wanting to save face which makes them seem stubborn. Also the film is based off a somewhat autobiographical short story so they couldn’t really change reality to make it have a happy ending. 

 

I personally have Grave of the Fireflies in my top 5 if not top 3 Ghibli films. I’d also recommend Spirited Away, My Neighbour Totoro, Princess Mononoke and Only Yesterday as must watch Ghibli films. 

There's a difference between the way the autobiography is written and this movie was written though. The short story (based on what I've read on the Wikipedia page) was written as an apology for his sister's death. We don't see a moment like that in the movie. The movie seems way more focused on blaming the war instead of the actions of the main character. It's Takahata's worst film imo.

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13 minutes ago, lorddemaxus said:

There's a difference between the way the autobiography is written and this movie was written though. The short story (based on what I've read on the Wikipedia page) was written as an apology for his sister's death. We don't see a moment like that in the movie. The movie seems way more focused on blaming the war instead of the actions of the main character. It's Takahata's worst film imo.

Spoiler

did we see the same movie? it literally shows the main character leaving the aunt house by his own choice and never returning even after his sister got sick. I don't see how you thought Takahata wasn't blaming the main character. it wasn't even subtle. we even see his reaction to the news of Japan's surrender.

 

16 minutes ago, lorddemaxus said:

Yeah, if the entire point of the movie is to pity a character whose pride caused what happened in the end, it's not really worth anyone's time. That's just misery-porn.

 

whether you could pity them or not is prolly up to you but I agree that it falls into the misery-porn genre, WW2 was quite miserable. a lot of anti-war films would fall into that if we start looking at them this way. Come & See and Schindler's List come to mind. 

 

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24 minutes ago, RealLyre said:
  Reveal hidden contents

 

 

whether you could pity them or not is prolly up to you but I agree that it falls into the misery-porn genre, WW2 was quite miserable. a lot of anti-war films would fall into that if we start looking at them this way. Come & See and Schindler's List come to mind. 

 

Theres never a single moment where the character understands he killed his sister. The movie never condemns the main character for doing what he did. The characters suffer a lot but the blame is entirely on the war and not the stupidity of the main character. If anything, the movie made the aunt look uptight. I can especially see many kids (the target audience) feel that his actions were justified. 

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4 minutes ago, lorddemaxus said:

Theres never a single moment where the character understands he killed his sister. The movie never condemns the main character for doing what he did. The characters suffer a lot but the blame is entirely on the war and not the stupidity of the main character. If anything, the made the aunt look uptight. I can especially see many kids (the target audience) feel that his actions were justified. 

you seem to really have it out for this movie but I think we are just having different interpretations to the movie, well first of all the main character was very young and naive so it makes sense that he never truly realizes that his actions lead to what happened in the end. he was even surprised to hear that Japan surrendered.

and 2nd as far as I remember there was a scene when a group of people see the main character & his sister eating their first meal inside the cave and comment how no one could survive living like that "outside the system". implying if this continues they will die. and another scene where the main character takes his sister to the doctor and they learn that her symptoms are mainly caused by malnutrition and that they should get more food. And before that when the farmer was telling them that he didn't have any more food to sell so he told the main character that he should swallow his pride and return to his aunt's house and apologize.

 

Quote

 I can especially see many kids (the target audience) feel that his actions were justified. 

this would probably be a problem of the audiences missing the point then imo. just like how people thought the Joker was "right" in the TDK & Joker or the ones who thought the guy from fight club was "good" or w/e.

 

 

 

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1 minute ago, RealLyre said:

he was even surprised to hear that Japan surrendered.

That was literally the reaction of the majority of the population as their tenno gave that announcment, they expected it to be the usual propaganda, to be now just more like endurance propaganda

 

Howfar are Western viewers aware how extreme the brainwashing of the pupils started already in school long before the war?

It was a complete other way of thinking, judging, ehics,...

 

 

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28 minutes ago, lorddemaxus said:

Theres never a single moment where the character understands he killed his sister. The movie never condemns the main character for doing what he did. The characters suffer a lot but the blame is entirely on the war and not the stupidity of the main character. If anything, the movie made the aunt look uptight. I can especially see many kids (the target audience) feel that his actions were justified. 

lmao wtf

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Found a wiki chapter, but that started decades earlier, means the parents of that generation too grew up like that, matchung to their time

 

Quote

Education

Even prior to the war, military education treated science as a way to teach that the Japanese were a morally superior race, and history as teaching pride in Japan, with Japan not being only the most splendid nation, but the only splendid one.[28]

After the attack on Pearl Harbor, elementary schools were renamed "National Schools" and charged to produce "children of the Emperor" who would sacrifice themselves for the nation.[29] Children were marched to school where half their time was spent on indoctrination on loyalty to the emperor, and frugality, obedience, honesty, and diligence.[30] Teachers were instructed to teach "Japanese science" based on the "Imperial Way", which precluded evolution in view of their claims to divine descent.[31] Students were given more physical education and required to perform community service.[32] Compositions, drawings, calligraphy, and pageants were based on military themes.[33] Those who left school after completing six years were required to attend night school for Japanese history and ethics, military training for boys, and home economics for girls.[32]

As the war went on, teachers lay more emphasis on the children's destiny as warriors; when one child grew airsick on a swing, a teacher told him he would not be a good fighter pilot.[34]Pupils were shown caricatures of Americans and British to instruct them about their enemy.[34]

Girls graduating on Okinawa heard a speech by their principal on how they must work hard to avoid shaming the school before they were inducted into the Student Corps to act as nurses.[35]

 

Military education... Kindergarteners and 1st graders learnt it too.

 

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24 minutes ago, RealLyre said:

you seem to really have it out for this movie but I think we are just having different interpretations to the movie, well first of all the main character was very young and naive so it makes sense that he never truly realizes that his actions lead to what happened in the end. he was even surprised to hear that Japan surrendered.

and 2nd as far as I remember there was a scene when a group of people see the main character & his sister eating their first meal inside the cave and comment how no one could survive living like that "outside the system". implying if this continues they will die. and another scene where the main character takes his sister to the doctor and they learn that her symptoms are mainly caused by malnutrition and that they should get more food. And before that when the farmer was telling them that he didn't have any more food to sell so he told the main character that he should swallow his pride and return to his aunt's house and apologize.

 

this would probably be a problem of the audiences missing the point then imo. just like how people thought the Joker was "right" in the TDK & Joker or the ones who thought the guy from fight club was "good" or w/e.

 

 

 

1. They could have easily changed the ending where the main character doesn't die and lives the rest of life feeling guilty for what happened (like the person the movie is based on). 

 

2. Yes, the movie shows multiple times that they are suffering but again, there's nothing that shows that this happened because of the main character. He's shown in a good light throughout the movie. If the point is that the main character's pride caused what happened, then it wouldn't be asking the audience to cry for him.

 

3. Except the people who think the Joker was right make up a small part of the target audience for that movie. The problem is that the majority of this movie's target audience will miss the point because that point isn't explicit enough for them to understand it and also because it asks them to cry for essentially his own stupidity. 

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Sooo, I have not seen the movie, but is it correct to assume it was primarily made for a Japanese audience?

If yes, I think a lot of the details some of us might feel are missing maybe were expected about the audience to be aware, feel in a certain way about the story beforehand?

 

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23 minutes ago, lorddemaxus said:

 

3. Except the people who think the Joker was right make up a small part of the target audience for that movie. The problem is that the majority of this movie's target audience will miss the point because that point isn't explicit enough for them to understand it and also because it asks them to cry for essentially his own stupidity. 


I think any time we start to project our own interpretations onto a general “target audience” of any sort, we run into trouble. Probably best to stick with just your reactions and opinion of the movie.

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20 minutes ago, lorddemaxus said:

If the point is that the main character's pride caused what happened, then it wouldn't be asking the audience to cry for him.

 

 

I disagree with the 2nd part, why wouldn't it ask you to cry for him? you could always choose not to but that's besides the point.  being prideful for stupid reasons always happens. and there's nothing that makes it contradictory to feel sorry for someone because of their own pride. regardless of how you feel about that person.

 

do you watch game of thrones? because something close to that happens in that show.

 

game of thrones spoilers below

Spoiler

when Ned stark dies in the first season because of his own stupidity and pride. 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

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