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"Suzuya Journey": Makoto Shinkai is not just about love this time

Following "Children of the Weather" in 2019, Makoto Shinkai went to the "three-year contract" with his new work "Journey to the Bell Bud". The film's box office has now exceeded 700 million yuan, surpassing "Your Name", which is also a work of Makoto Shinkai. (with a cumulative box office of 576 million yuan), it became the highest-grossing Japanese animated film in Chinese mainland.

"Journey to the Bell Buds" not only achieved good results in Japan and China, but also was shortlisted for the main competition unit of the 73rd Berlin Film Festival. This is the second Japanese animated film to be shortlisted for the award after Hayao Miyazaki's Spirited Away. "Suzuya's Journey" tells the story of the young girl Suzuya who meets the "closed door" Kusata and travels around the island of Japan with him to prevent the earthquake disaster and gain self-redemption.

"Suzuya Journey": Makoto Shinkai is not just about love this time

As the final work of Makoto Shinkai's "disaster trilogy", "Journey to the Bell Bud" is different from the previous two in that it jumps out of the perspective from personal emotions to face larger social issues, and the overall pattern has been significantly upgraded. Set against the backdrop of the 2011 "3.11" earthquake in Japan, the film uses the form of a road movie to build the theme on the reality of post-disaster home reconstruction and psychological reconstruction through what the protagonist has seen, heard, and thought.

The story adopts a reverse order method, starting from the dilemma of Suzuya and setting in the usual time loop of Japanese animation, step by step uncovering the hidden pain of Suzuya 12 years ago. Suzuya is a survivor of the "3.11" earthquake, in which her mother was tragically killed. On the surface, she is an optimistic and cheerful middle school student, but deep inside, she has left indelible wounds. She and the mysterious teenager Kusata meet fatefully, and the "closed door" Kusata looks around for the "vermido" energy that causes the earthquake, and avoids the disaster by closing the "door". Suzuya eagerly helps Kusata "close the door", even sacrificing his own life.

"Suzuya Journey": Makoto Shinkai is not just about love this time

Here has been criticized by many audiences, because the film does not use too much space to tell the germination and growth of the relationship between the hero and heroine, and the life and death of the two seem a little abrupt. This may be a struggle for Makoto Shinkai to face a new challenge, or it may be a sacrifice as the director devotes more space to more important themes – memory, disaster and hope.

The "vermicom" is born in the "ruins" after the earthquake, and the power of closing the "door" comes from the "thought of the past", that is, the recollection of the good memories of this land. Suzuya accompanies Kusanagi all the way, constantly looking for people's memories of the past. Finally, she returns to the hometown where the earthquake occurred as a child, bringing back memories of her past. As a survivor of the big earthquake, Suzuya has a sense of guilt, and every time she closes the "door", she is "not afraid of death"; Kusata, on the other hand, is sacrificed to suppress the "vermi", he repeatedly expresses his heart, "I want to live". When Suzuya rescued Kusata and said "the future is not terrible" to her childhood self, she also completed her self-growth and redemption and gained a new life.

"Suzuya Journey": Makoto Shinkai is not just about love this time

Through a fantasy journey, the film focuses on the "scars" brought by natural disasters such as earthquakes to individuals, families and society, and conveys warm and healing humanistic feelings. For audiences who have experienced the new crown pneumonia epidemic, the disaster narrative of "Journey to the Bell Buds" and past memories form a certain consoling force to a large extent, which may be an important reason why the film resonates in different countries.

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