The Garden Of Words Film Review

Words, Creating A True Garden

The Garden of Words (Hepburn: Kotonoha no Niwa) is a 2013 Japanese anime comedy/drama film written, directed, and edited by Makoto Shinkai, animated by CoMix Wave Films, and distributed by Toho. It stars Miyu Irino and Kana Hanazawa and featured music by Daisuke Kashiwa instead of Tenmon, who had composed the music for many of Shinkai's previous films. The theme song, "Rain", was originally written and performed by Senri Oe in 1988, but was remade for the film and was sung by Motohiro Hata. The film was made into a manga, with illustrations by Midori Motohashi, and later novelized by Shinkai, both in the same year as the film.

The film focuses on Takao Akizuki, an aspiring 15-year-old shoemaker, and Yukari Yukino, a mysterious 27-year-old woman he keeps meeting at Shinjuku Gyoen National Garden on rainy mornings. While Takao is skipping his morning class to design shoes, Yukari is avoiding work due to personal problems in her professional life. Yukari tells Takao nothing about herself, including her name, while Takao opens up to her, sharing his passion for shoes by offering to make a pair for her. When Takao learns Yukari's identity, emotions come to a head as both learn that they have been teaching each other "how to walk". Shinkai wrote the story as a tale of "lonely sadness", based on the meaning of the traditional Japanese word for "love", and uses shoes as a metaphor for life. The story's motifs include rain, Man'yōshū poetry, and the Japanese garden. The age difference between the two main characters and their character traits demonstrate how awkwardly and disjointedly people mature, where even adults sometimes feel no more mature than teenagers, according to Shinkai.

The Garden of Words premiered at the Gold Coast Film Festival in Australia on April 28, 2013, and had its general release on May 31, 2013 in Japan. For the Japanese premiere, the film was screened with an animated short called Dareka no Manazashi (lit. Someone's Gaze), also directed by Shinkai. The Garden of Words had an unusual release schedule since it was released digitally on iTunes the same day as the Japanese theatrical premiere, and its DVD and Blu-ray were released while the film was still in theaters, on June 21. The film has been licensed by Sentai Filmworks in North America, Anime Limited in the UK, and Madman Entertainment in Australia. The film performed well in theaters for an extended period of time and was hosted at many local and international film events. It ranked highly on iTunes Store during 2013 and was selected as the Year's Best Animation in iTunes' Best of 2013. It won the 2013 Kobe Theatrical Film Award and awards at the Fantasia International Film Festival and the Stuttgart Festival of Animated Film. Online reviews were generally favorable with universal praise of the art, though opinions were mixed regarding the story's length, plot, and emotional climax.

Here is the Trailer of the Film

Don't worry I am not going to spoil the real fun of watching the film. But if you wanna read my views of significance; you should have to watch the film beforehand; then you can understand my perspectives easily. Now let's come to the point of our real discussion of the significance of the Garden of Words Films. 

There is a little dilemma once I asked myself; what is a true Garden created by words? _ is it something of a creative mind, blooms in the surrounding of a garden; or something truly innovative for a change of pace in life through catalyst words!

I think the latter is symbolically more oppressive than before. Still, it is nothing to the whole human metabolism which provides infinite types of expression. “The original expression is not something to be oppressed but to be expressed” – and how you are going to accept that expression is something totally up to you. You can be moved; you can be inspired; you can be helped but you can’t be dominated by that. And that is the meaning of “The Garden of Words.”

• An over-viewed garden where a boy is finding his path not only in academics but also in his passion and a girl is finding ways to settle down not only in life but also her true mind. Both are stumbling along the footsteps of eternity. But did you know what actually fate is; it is that time when they met in the Garden. Two, not having what is required, having it in others – that is what this fate is. Both are struggling, trying to get a little accelerator in their life. And it happened, the interaction between two polar beings, the exchange of some maestro, provides them with many lights of gradual choices. The so-called garden is not a garden now; it becomes a human solace for them. There, they are the only inhabitants, connected by only words, forming a relationship that is beyond any mortal relationship. It is neither romantic nor dependable, filling their voids with the words of others, creating a manifesto of words that cannot be expressed by any literature now. It is their life, itself, sonneteering their success in their own fields, that nature can only be understood now. But here comes the hard part as they both served their purposes in each other’s life. Gradually comes the part of parting. It is only remained to express their beings to each other as soon as possible before leaving by something identical that can express its representation easily. “Love indeed: Love as is” – is the only thing that can explain any complex feelings into an understandable phenomenon. Yes, they did and moved on in life but what is it? What is it that remains? That remains for us to indulge.

• “The Garden of Words” by all means, a Garden soothing for all eternal beings; more expensive than any flower garden; richer in its own aspects. It is this Garden that remains, providing us thought for our solitary. “Are we going to be a solitary reaper of words also?” – is totally up to us.

Thank You for Reading. You can interpret it as a movie review or an innovative of your own.  This time it is short, I know but still please stay tuned for more.