Review Piece: Tokyo Godfathers (Secret Santa)

Two years ago, I reviewed Paprika by the late Satoshi Kon for fellow anime blog Reverse Thieves' annual Secret Santa event, so here's my review of another Kon movie. Check out what I thought after the jump.

Why Tokyo Godfathers?

There were two main reasons why I decided to choose Tokyo Godfathers as my Secret Santa review this year. First, the fact that this is a Christmas movie (sort of) so it was appropriate for this time. Second, two years after I said I would, I still haven't seen much of Kon's works besides Paprika and Paranoia Agent. 

Hopefully this will make up for it and I can continue to watch more of Kon's works in 2013, this time for real. Now I admit that I do like some Christmas movies (my favorite being It's a Wonderful Life) so I did expect to like this one, but I never expected what I was going to see as this isn't your typical Christmas movie.

What is it about?

Taking place from Christmas Eve to New Year's Day, Tokyo Godfathers follows three homeless people as they spend Christmas Eve getting food and looking through trash. It is then that they discover an abandoned baby in a pile of trash. Armed with only a bag that contains clue's to the baby's parents, the three decide to find the parents but face harsh obstacles along the way that conflict with not only the reason why the baby was abandoned but also facing each of their own pasts as well. Not going to go deeper in of course as this would be spoilery.

Who are our characters?

The movie follows an alcoholic old man called Gin, a transvestite named Hana and a runaway teenage girl named Miyuki. Its not exactly clear how long the three have been travelling together or even how long its been since each of them had became homeless, but they pretty much function as a sort of family with Hana as the mother, Gin as the father and Miyuki as the teenage daughter.

Much like in Paprika, I never found any flaws with these characters, they're just so likable and you want them to find baby Kiyoko's parents. Its true that they don't always get along, but they still stick by each other no matter what despite the situation they're caught up in. Its worth noting that Keiko Nobumoto who created Wolf's Rain and wrote the screenplay for Cowboy Bebop also wrote the screenplay for this movie alongside Kon which may have helped get the likability across.

How Good does it look/sound?

Once again, Satoshi Kon's visuals impress. The fluidity of his animations, once again aided by Madhouse, continue to stun me but there is a distinct difference between this and Paprika; while Paprika was colorful and disorientating much like a dream, Tokyo Godfathers is much darker and harsher. It makes sense because this is to help show just how real and gritty this is supposed to be. The backgrounds are constantly filled with bags of garbage or debris but also hard lighting and snow, its a little strange to say but its beautiful. The soundtrack was also pretty great, the composer was actually Keiichi Suzuki who did the soundtrack to several films but also one of my favourite video games of all time: Earthbound for the Super Nintendo so that was really cool.

The voice acting was also really nice. Usually I watch the English dub of an anime if its available but Tokyo Godfathers doesn't have one so I had to go with subs for this one. The voice acting is pretty great in getting across the drama or comedy in each scene across very well. Each of the main voice actors are actually pretty unknown which is a shame because I'd love to hear them in more stuff but as far as I know this is the only anime each of them have performed.

Overall

Tokyo Godfathers is another great film by Satoshi Kon. It tells a great story of miracles and family wrapped up in one package. It doesn't sugarcoat situations or talk down to it's audience either, this is truly something that any anime fan (or even if you're not a fan) can enjoy especially around this time of the year. Speaking of that, Christmas and New Year isn't exactly the focus because these events just happen to take place during then. It sort of makes it better because you can pretty much watch this anytime and you wouldn't feel too strange for doing so unlike other Christmas movies. Bottom line, you should watch Tokyo Godfathers whenever you get the chance to do so.

I hope you all enjoyed my review. I wish everybody reading and everyone at One Piece at a Time Blog a very safe and a Merry Christmas. But if you don't celebrate Christmas then Happy Holidays. Thank you very much and see you all later.