Director: Mamoru Hosoda
FIRST REVIEW YAY. Um, anyway. Down to business, yes? Toki wo kakeru shoujo is considered the (unofficial?) sequel to the novel and 1983 live-action movie of the same name. People who have had the joy of both reading that book AND watching the film will notice various references to each throughout this particular film. I guess you can consider it a treat to all the fans of the originals from back in the day, hmm?
To us Western audiences, the film seems to be pretty extraordinary. To the Japanese audience, this is barely above average as far as anime films go. Though I do admit I was positively thrilled by this film, there are some ways that it could be more amazing ... but we'll save that for after the actual review.
Protagonist tomboy Makoto is a scatterbrained junior high student. A natural klutz, always running late and who claims she's not that smart, she much prefers to play baseball with her two guy friends Chiaki and Kousuke than hang out with the giggling girls of her school.
On a lazy summer afternoon, she's charged with delivering various files to the science lab for her after school duties. While investigating an odd presence in the back room, she finds herself the victim of yet another klutz attack. Suddenly, she's whisked off through a flashy series of images - from stampeding animals to rampaging warriors - before she finds herself staring up at the ceiling of the back room, wondering what the hell just happened.
It isn't long before Makoto discovers what exactly happened to her in the science lab. She finds herself with the amazing ability to leap through time - and in the most literal of senses, too, as she needs to run and make a leap to get the ability to work. Through much trial and error she perfects the technique, although her landings are never quite painless (she usually ends up in a rolling/barreling directly into some painfully hard object, ending up in many bruises and 'ouch' moments).
Using her newly acquired skill, Makoto starts to use it to fix the aspects of her day that she didn't quite like. From going back in time to retake the test she earlier failed to managing to dodge a boy sailing her way, she repairs all the bad aspects of the day that seems to plague the life of a teenager.
And then she starts to realize that altering these things begins to shatter the friendship she has with Chiaki and Kousuke. She tries to repair things repeatedly, she tries to make everyone happy - and yet it never seems to work out just right. No matter how hard she tries, nothing works, and someone always seems to end up in pain.
As she continues to try and repair things, Makoto begins to notice that she's limited in the leaps she can make - and, as we all notice, she's found this out a bit too late in the game to truely fix the big things that really matter to her.
At the end of the movie, Makoto radiates an air of accomplishment; the air of one who's been through suffering and agony and has triumphed. She's grown and gotten wiser, so different from the teenager we first met at the beginning of the movie and yet so much the same girl.
So, what are the flaws I spoke of from the beginning, you ask? Well, there are some inconsistencies in the storyline that are due to the various leaps Makoto goes through (which I'm not about to explain, as I manage to confuse myself on the matter if I overthink it; besides, it gives away spoilers, which I'd prefer not to do). These inconsistencies are only to be expected, though, as with all movies dealing with the time travel paradox matter.
The feeling of lazy, drawling summer days is held perfectly throughout the movie. One can almost feel the heat of the days, surrounded by the low hum of the insects, while watching the outdoor scenes where Makoto, Chiaki, and Kousuke are on the baseball diamond, engaging in ordinary talk of their daily lives amongst each other.
The great emotional scenes are also a wonderful bit. With Makoto, you feel like laughing and crying whenever she does. You can feel the pain, love, and despair that every character is going through - a difficult task considering its just a bunch of 2D characters on screen, there. In fact, I'd say the film's ability to flawlessly manage to evoke such raw emotions is probably one of the best aspects of the movie. It makes us viewers empathize with the characters, something that escapes the western animated films we're bombarded with.
Overall, Toki wo kakeru shoujo is an endearing, tug-at-your-heartstrings sort of movie that will have you coming back to watch it over and over again.
As always, I recommend you give the original version a shot before trying out the dub - there's just some things that can't be conveyed across languages, and there's so much more feel to the original voices.
Ahknee/Kitteen's rating: 
on 1 September 2008