Solid movie and pretty looking (+1 rating for that). Glad to see that Shinkai is moving forward and for once not doing "teenage romance" nostalgia. 5cm/s & the Place Promised in Our Early Days while pretty looking just didn't work storywise for me. Voices of a Distant Star was fine (only read the manga though). Props to keeping the story relatively short instead of bloating it.

I’ve never been more confused by the collective ratings on here. The artwork is absolutely gorgeous but it’s wasted on the most bizarre (and inappropriate?) storyline. [spoiler] A 15 year old high school student meets a 27 year old woman drinking alcohol at the park during a rainstorm and every subsequent time it rains they meet up there. He then learns the job she is ditching every day to sit at the park and drink is as a teacher at HIS school. I went back and forth questioning whether this was supposed to be a romance or not?? Did I not get it? I watched it on Kanopy and the translation and subtitles were sometimes off so I don’t know if that played a role? Either way, the film was very short and the big final scene where they are crying in each other’s arms made no sense to me when there was zero character or relationship development. The long scenes of the weather and the cityscape were beautiful but the storyline fell flat. Am I missing something? [/spoiler]

Breathtaking animations and a solid set of music throughout. You feel a slowness to the film at times, that builds slowly until the release. But it worked for the film. There could’ve been more said, more words to explain how the characters felt. But I think it was more impactful because of what wasn’t said. In a very short amount of time that the film takes, I was able to empathize with the characters and I love the relationship between the simplicity of their lives and the complexity of their emotions. [spoiler]When the characters finally opened up to each other, it felt like a breath of fresh air. They were each drowning in their lives, lonely and looked down upon. But together, they could finally breathe.[/spoiler] It’s a simple story, but poetic and meaningful.

I have never seen such a clean animation movie, the drawing and animation is just breathtaking ! I didn't really know what to wait from this film, as I just had this film in my list and I didn't know Shinkai. I saw Kimi no na wa a couple of days before and realised I had this film from him in my list, so decided to give it a go. I'm not such a fan of romances, but I have to admit I really enjoyed it ! the background of each character is shown piece by piece throughout the film, slowly revealing them, with numerous (maybe too much ?) shots showing the city or the scenery to keep the pace slow but steady. the music is quite good, with sang parts and instrumentals, I must say I was fond of the atmosphere. I was surprised by the length, but I have to admit that it prevents the film from being sluggish and boring. Clearly, I'm rating this a 9 for the drawing style and the atmosphere, while I would rate the overall story a 7-8, great work !

More like Garden Of Feet.