aurora121

When I started watching this I was thinking that it reminded me of The Prisoner and The Stepford Wives which I still think is where a lot of the plot came from. Unfortunately it's not actually as good as either of those two.

So what is good is what it looks like, some way over the top costuming and a great setting help this a lot. The acting is just about good enough, the story is all over the place and the director totally fails to raise any sort of tension in the more dramatic second half of the film.

It's a shame really as there's a good story hidden in there about gender roles in society, inequality and being yourself rather than pleasing others.

This is the first film that I've seen by Naoko Yamada and while in some ways I'm impressed in others I think it was gallant failure.

Starting with the good, like most modern Japanese anime it looks great and at times simply stunning. The voice actors do a great job and at over two hours it's great value for money. It might also be worth mentioning at the screening I went to the cinema was about half full, which is a good turn out for a sub-titled animated feature.

Unfortunately it's not a film that I particularly want to watch again and there a number of reasons for that. While I'm aware that it's based on a manga, it feels too long and I'm sorry to say depressing. Most of the characters are people that you wouldn't want to spend much time with and there is maybe only one scene that could be called funny. Also just because it's long doesn't mean that all the conflicts are going to be resolved.

Don't get me wrong if you're an anime fan you're probably going to like this, but I can't see it appealing to a wider audience.

I saw this film on holiday in Bangkok recently and it was so much better than I thought it was going to be. I didn't have too much trouble working out the 'twist', truth is the title is a spoiler anyway. But that didn't stop the enjoyment, in fact it made you think more about the situation the two lead characters were in and the consequences that would mean to them.

In fact my only regret is that this won't get seen by a wider audience, or perhaps worse still it will get remade into a version much worse than this one. For now all I can say is see it, it will make you realize how much more complicated life could be.