JAPAN, Our Homeland

Even as an avid anime fan I am still pleasantly surprised to come across an anime movie that is as humble and down-to-earth, such as Furusato, Japan. The strongest point presented in this movie is it has such a low-key attitude against the severity of the setting (post WWII economical situation). The movie chose not to dwell too much drama on the tragic side of things, but focus on the key message it was meant to deliver - a sense of optimism and the importance of preserving one's culture and looking forward to the future.

Speaking of the point of being humble, I have come across many anime masterpieces (Ghibli's works for instance) that blew me away with characters that are natural and well-loved, but Furusato is unique in my view in that all of its characters - adults and children alike - acted well within what was expected of their age group and did not overact, more importantly they made decisions with rational, maturity and completely genuine intentions; all these truly garnered my respect. Furusato is perhaps one of the closest anime I have seen that portray properly how people should behave individually and as a society in real life, even when they make mistakes.

Due to this unique factor, the movie deserves 7 stars despite a relatively simple storyline and amateur animation techniques. Understandably for the lack of character development, some quick research pointed out that this movie was intended more like an appreciation piece rather than a character-driven story.