OP
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SYNOPSIS
Entranced by surfing and the sea, Hinako Mukaimizu is a spirited girl who attends college in a coastal city with no consideration for her future career. Her life takes an unexpected turn when a fireworks mishap sets the apartment building she lives in ablaze, where she is saved by a talented firefighter named Minato Hinageshi. Upon meeting, the two quickly become acquainted with one another—Hinako is instantly enamored by Minato's reliable personality and passion for saving others, while Minato is intrigued by surfing and is eager to learn how. As Hinako begins to teach Minato about surfing, the pair eventually fall in love and begin a gentle and devoted relationship.
However, while surfing may seem fun and carefree, it can still be a dangerous and unpredictable activity. This is what Hinako learns when a surfing incident completely changes her life, leaving her forced to contemplate her undecided future. In search of her own calling, Hinako begins her journey of self-discovery, keeping Minato by her side as she gradually attempts to find her purpose and ride her own wave.
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Very much recomend If you're looking for a very emotional movie. It does a very good job at getting you invested from the very first song. I found myself physicaly wanting to sing with Hinako, and crying hard with the ending. It's just a good story about moving on and finding yourself through love. I also think it did a realy good job with other characters besides the leads, giving them proper story and development. The animation is good, it does a great job in conveying the event, but nothing breathtakingly beautiful. It's not as much focused on actions as it is on emotions of the characters, but that is to be expected from a movie of this genre. The general flow of the story is pretty predictable, but with a few scenes and moments that take you by surprise.
This movie really only has four characters (disregarding the work bosses and such). These four are: Minato, a firefighter. Hinako, a college student who loves surfing. Wasabi, another firefighter and coworker of Minato. Youko, Minato's sister. For most of this, I will mostly bring up Hinako and Minato because they are who the story is for.
It all begins with Hinako surfing really. Minato always looks out into the ocean whenever the possibility presents itself at his work if he sees the orange toned surfboard and the person on it riding the waves. It's simply a pleasant sight for him to look at and one that he finds beautiful. Visually, I do agree. While for him it's more of a love sort of deal, as a viewer I think the setting and character designs throughout the film are pleasing. So no complaints on my end here. In motion, it all looks so bubbly. Considering the underlying theme being water, this feels fitting. Regardless, going back to Minato, he sees the beauty of the person surfing and calls her his hero....from afar.
This changes one night when an apartment complex ignites on fire due to illegal fireworks being fired nearby. A person isn't accounted for during the head count of evacuees so he goes to rescue them. Upon arriving to their location, he sees the orange surfboard and she sees a hero. He is her hero....from nearby.
Ride Your Wave is a beautiful tale of love, loss, and managing grief. It tells an important story. More importantly, it tells it very well. Surprisingly, I had no complaints about any aspect of the film and very much enjoyed my time watching it. As is also very unusual for me, I will definitely be rewatching it. This movie is going down as one of my favourites. I think the story is important, the characters were well developed, and the visual style is second-to-none. Finally, the soundtrack was killer and I love how the main song is integrated as a large part of the story and a very important plot device. This movie is well worth your time. Please consider watching it.
Story
If you’ve read any of my other reviews, you may get the sense that I’m slightly addicted to sad movies. Okay, maybe I’m very addicted. Ride Your Wave is a beautiful story that deals with love, loss, and grief. Without spoiling the premise of the movie, the main character goes on an arduous journey and has to learn to cope with the loss of a loved one. It really is a beautiful story, and it felt very real and relevant. Everyone grieves in their own ways, and this story is a very creative expression of grief and individual experience. Honestly, I loved it. The first 30 or so minutes are great, but once the movie really takes off it becomes even greater. I honestly thought this was a romcom when I downloaded it so I wasn’t expecting such a gripping story, but boy am I happy I was wrong. This movie was amazing. Honestly, I have no complaints about the story, which is quite strange and unusual for me. I was captured from the very first moment until the very last. Ride Your Wave is definitely worth your time.
Characters
Again, I really have no complaints about the characters in this story. As is normal for a movie, there isn’t as much character development as in, say, a full series, though this isn’t a problem because the characters are written well right out of the gate. I don’t even have any complaints about the main character! She wasn’t cringe at all! The characterization in this film was superb, and I really enjoyed how every character dealt with their mutual grief in very different ways, which I feel reflects reality quite well. No complaints at all.
Visuals
When I first watched the trailer for Ride Your Wave, I wasn’t sold on the visual style. I thought it was going to be poorly animated. WOW, was I wrong. This movie had beautiful animation, and a beautiful colour palette. I’m a huge fan of vibrant colours, which this movie made use of. I would definitely say from an animation/design standpoint, this movie belongs right up there with something like Violet Evergarden. Though, not the same style, it still manages to pull of its own style with a very high level of mastery. I was very impressed, and I will have to check out the studio’s other work.
Music
Music plays an incredibly integral part to the overall atmosphere of the film, and the main song actually plays a very large part in the story. The beauty of the main song is that it actually becomes more and more relevant as the movie goes on, and by the end of the film it really takes on its full meaning and can be enjoyed to the fullest extent. I really liked it. It’s on my “Japanese Music” spotify playlist now. I really, really, really liked it. Both the version with the main characters singing and the soundtrack version. They are both great.
Enjoyment
It’s no secret… I enjoyed this film. I’m giving it a perfect score for a reason. It’s strange for me to give a movie a perfect score and to have zero complaints about any of the aspects of the film. Typically, films excel in one area while trailing in another, or they experience some type of Jack-of-all-trades-master-of-none type of problem where they are just meh at everything but not great at anything. This movie does not suffer that problem. Ride Your Wave manages to tell an important, timeless, and inspirational tale about managing grief, and I think it stands above any other animated film I’ve watched in recent memory. It is going on my favourites-of-all-time list for sure. Please, do yourself a favour and watch this film and allow yourself to be fully immersed for the short 1.5 hour watch-time. You won’t regret it.
All in all this movie had a very deep meaning, and it showed the story of one hero falling in love, the story of someone who wanted to give back in life and save others the way he was saved, the story of losing someone you love, and also about finding yourself and being able to let go. It was a beautifully told story and it was really emotional for me. 100% recommend to anyone.
If you enjoyed this review, please feel free to check out my other anime i posted
MY OTHER ANIME MOVIE POST
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