Ah, a story about a wolf and a goat becoming friends. Going into this movie, I expected a lot of cheese with this recipe to get it even remotely off the ground, but The whole set-up of the premise was surprisigly well told here. Sure, the goat is a bit of a masochist, but the writing of the parts where they meet each other and become friends is top notch.
Instead of the usual cheesy lines here, the characters can actually speak to each other in a normal way, and they’re aware of the issues that come with their friendship. It’s both interesting for kids and adults to watch. It takes a deeper look at the usual “wolves and goats don’t go together”, and especially the nonchalant way of the lead characters, instead of the usual angst you see with these kinds of stories, stands out as interesting. Beyond that there are also enough comical moments for the kids to enjoy.
As the movie goes on however, it turns more and more into a “been there done that” star crossed friends type of story. It starts to more and more follow the generic formula for these kids of stories, but the characters make it nice to watch. The creators lose it near the ending, though. The movie ends with a bunch of really weird deus ex machina that have no purpose whatsoever, especially considering the messages that it wanted to convey. It’s the type of ending that actually makes the rest of the movie also less good, because of all of the build-up it just nullifies thanks to the completely stupid twists it pulls.
So yeah, for the Wolf versus Sheep/Goad storyk, I’d recommend Chirin no Suzu over Arashi no Yoru ni, but at least it has a lot of eye candy here. This movie looks unlike any other movie I’ve seen. The camera work is also pretty interesting here. It’s a nice watch in any case, though don’t expect anything special.
| Storytelling: | 7/10 – Nice atmosphere and pleasant pacing, though it also has a number of very blatant Deus ex Machina, and these are pretty bad ones. |
| Characters: | 8/10 – Good and down to earth chemistry between the lead characters for this type of story. |
| Production-Values: | 8/10 – Very interesting looking graphics and animation, though some parts (most notably the muddy river) stick out as a sore thumb. |
| Setting: | 7/10 – Some nondescript landscape. I feel like the creators could have done better to flesh it out. |
Suggestions:
– Chirin no Suzu
– Yobi – The Five-Tailed Fox
Okay…WHAT? The goat a MASOCHIST!? Where in the world did you come up with that idea? I mean, sure the goat (SPOILERS) did in fact offer itself up to the wolf as food at one point, but that was because they were stuck in a blizzard and couldn’t get food on their own! At that point he realized that wolves eat goats to survive, not because they do it for the heck of it! Even he knows that much! (END SPOILERS) Yes, I remember that much even though I saw it only two years ago. Forgive me for sounding a bit blunt, but that’s kinda how I saw it back then. Even so, I still liked the movie even if the ending seemed a tad cliche. But I didn’t care. And yes, I do think Chirin no Suzu is a bit better than it.