The other day, Studio Ghibli’s 1993 film Ocean Waves was playing as a revival screening at Bunkamura Le Cinema in Shibuya, so I went to see it.
Looking it up now, there is a source novel by Saeko Himuro. (Update: I also read the novel. It was wonderful. There are two volumes; the first covers the high-school years that the film adapts, and the second continues into university life and beyond, which the film does not include.)
I will not dig deep into the plot — just a light lead-in.
The image is a coming-of-age anime set in Kochi.
The story centers on high-schooler Taku Morisaki and Rikako Muto, the heroine who transfers in from Tokyo.
This heroine is proud of her looks, looks down on Kochi and the Kochi dialect because she is from the city, and is basically an annoying type.
It is a film with romance in it too, but while watching I kept thinking: if someone like that existed in real life, I would fight with them constantly.
(※ I had often seen Ocean Waves as a thumbnail on those YouTube city-pop compilation playlists, so I knew the art style — but then it felt like a reveal: “So that woman in the thumbnail — the heroine — was this kind of person!”)
Through the whole film I felt a nostalgic sense that yeah, in high school everyone was carrying their own frustrations.
(As an aside: I spent six years of middle and high school at an all-boys school, with zero romance, nothing to throw myself into — just a dark six years that left a bit of trauma — so I am not a valid comparison. If I start comparing, it is so pathetic I feel like I might faint.)
In recent years, 80s and 90s fashion has been popular in clothes and music, and the characters’ fashion and culture in the film are really good. They hit hard.
The main feature is about 70 minutes.
Needless to say the landscapes are beautiful, but I watched each scene thinking how rare it is to capture friendship with the best friend, and the relationship with the heroine, so precisely in the dialogue of the moment — it felt almost wasteful to let any scene go.
For Ghibli, The Wind Rises is still my absolute runaway number one — but I came to like this film a lot too.
What got me to go was seeing someone on X post that there was a revival in Shibuya, and that Ocean Waves is a wonderful film.
Shibuya is close, the run was short, and I had never seen it, so I reserved a seat on the spot.
When I booked, that day was sold out, and even for other days at the times I wanted, only the front row was left — that busy.
Probably more people noticed because of SNS, especially X.
I had rarely gone somewhere or bought something because of X, but I felt the strength of SNS again.
By chance, just yesterday I also talked with someone whose business is mainly SNS. They said many operators put too much expectation on purchase and conversion — but among people looking at SNS, awareness and consideration layers dominate. So you must not set expectations on purchase. That really clicked.
At the same time, unlike other tactics, SNS’s awareness-expansion effect is overwhelmingly high, so you should develop products specialized for SNS — that also clicked.
By the way, for SNS that spreads to trend level, X is apparently the strongest.
Back to the film: when you watch content changes the impression completely.
Being able to see Ocean Waves for the first time as an adult felt really good, and I could feel its quality deeply.
If I had seen it in high school, as I said, I was at an all-boys school — I would have just felt envious and frustrated and that would have been the end.
Conversely, there are plenty of works I think I would have enjoyed more if I had read them as a kid.
As a manga example: I recently bought all volumes of Kazuhiro Fujita’s Karakuri Circus and have been reading them. It is fun, but somehow I feel I have become too much of an adult to digest shonen-manga momentum.
Lots of people recommend Karakuri Circus, and I had tried a few times before and quit each time — now I am reading through the whole series bit by bit again.
Zatch Bell!, which was also running in Weekly Shonen Sunday at the time, I was obsessed with in elementary and middle school, and it is still one of my favorites.
But if I started it from zero as an adult now, I am not sure I could enjoy it the same way.
That is all.
P.S.
I remember Toshio Okada praising on YouTube the short On Your Mark, which was screened with Whisper of the Heart — I want to see that someday too.
Come to think of it I cannot even recall the plot of Whisper of the Heart; I hope that gets a revival as well.
Okada has quirks, but his depth of knowledge and the way he talks so you can enjoy it are outstanding. Otaking. A genius.
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