TrueJoshNight Truly Dreadful Film

LastingAware The greatest movie ever!

Bessie Smyth Great story, amazing characters, superb action, enthralling cinematography. Yes, this is something I am glad I spent money on.

Marva-nova Amazing worth wacthing. So good. Biased but well made with many good points.

The Movie Diorama If it isn't a fantasy epic with imaginative visuals, then it's a humanistic war drama focusing on Japanese traditions. Surprisingly, this newer addition to Ghibli's canon is far more lesser than the heavy themes that are typically conveyed. Goro learnt from his previous directorial effort and, with the advice from daddy anime genius Hayao Miyazaki, has crafted a sweet romantic tale. A young girl and her friends assist with renovating the Latin Quarter clubhouse at her academy, although soon starts developing a romance with one of the boys there. Think of it as teen romance but substituting silly school comedy with stunningly gorgeous animation. I sound like a broken tape recorder, but my word the animation is absolutely picturesque. Studio Ghibli consistently pump out amazing anime feature films like a rabbit humping anything that moves. Efficient. Gloriously efficient. From the homely aesthetics of Poppy Hill to the vibrant blue waves of the nearby sea, every single frame was a work of art. Then Miyazaki beautifully blends the mesmerising musical score to create a symphony of colours that invades all the senses. To then embed the bustling port town ambience with the other imperative elements really does create a world. It's not just a painting, but a window to this idyllic environment that feels alive. The story, whilst competently told, does feel too minimal and that's mostly down to the underdeveloped characters. Umi and Shun clearly adore each other in a subtle way, however there is a lack of expression that detracts from the relationship between these two teenagers. There were about five emotional scenes where only one really impacted me, that's due to how one-dimensional the plot and characters are. It comes across as a soap opera, which is a shame. There are nice touches such as the daily flag raising and Umi's motherly routine that injects some personality, but on the whole it feels monotonous. A perfectly animated film is let down by a story that lacks power.

Neil Welch In 1963 Yokohama, high school girl Umi puts out signal flags to passing ships, partly in remembrance of her captain father who died at sea. While getting involved with a project to save a local clubhouse, she meets and falls in love with fellow student Shun. But Shun's father was also lost at sea, and he carries the same photograph as Umi...This animated movie from Studio Ghibli has no fantasy elements: it is a simple drama with several intertwined threads. The animation is satisfactory without being dazzling, the backgrounds are lovely, and the film is, at times, very moving.I enjoyed it a lot.

aldri-feb Following the tradition of Ghibli animated movie, "From Up on Poppy Hill" is a good work of art filled with solid graphic animation, overwhelming storyline and surrounded by beautiful-gentle music. The movie delivers thick Japanese culture and interesting romantic love story from Umi and Shun character. It shows processes how the growth feelings between their relationship as they spend more time together and some obstacles both of them have to face to defend their feelings. From his second directorial, Goro Miyazaki prefers to play safe and doesn't offer much conflict in it which makes "From Up on Poppy Hill" felt too flat and gives less impression than other of masterpiece Ghibli cartoon. With no magical character or even a bad guy and has much attention on finding identity and romance, it could bored kids audience. Afterall "From Up on Poppy Hill" is still satisfying and a quite fun film to see, but could have much potential to be amusing if they want to explore more in it.

tieman64 Directed by Studio Ghibli's Goro Miyazaji, son of master animator Hayao Miyazaki, "From Up on Poppy Hill" tells the story of Umi Matsuzai, a high-school girl living in 1964, Yokohama, Japan."Poppy's" first act finds Umi locked in a world of rigid ritual. With her father dead and her mother abroad, Umi spends her days taking care of family members and tending to various domestic duties. Umi's life takes a turn when she meets Shun Kazama, the cute kid who runs her school's newspaper club.From this point onwards, "Poppy" resembles Yoshifumi Kondo's "Whisper of the Heart" and Isao Takahata's "Only Yesterday". Umi and Shun flirt amidst gorgeous landscapes, bicycling through bustling cities, strolling along walkways and attending dinner parties at Umi's picturesque home, perched high above the Japanese coastline. And if his father's films tend to be preoccupied with air-planes and airships, Goro's "Poppy" is awash with ocean-liners, freighters and tug-boats, which seem to perpetually glide across the film's many distant horizons.Like ships in the night, Umi and Shun similarly, tentatively, approach and avoid one another. The film's later acts then find our puppy lovers joining forces to save a school clubhouse which is set for demolition. They hope to restore it, to prevent its demise, a restoration project which points to a rejection of Japan's process of post-war modernisation. "We can learn from history!" Shun says, but nobody's listening. With the 1964 Tokyo Olympics on the horizon, Japan seeks a clean break with her past, but it's this past which Shun and Umi hope to preserve. They advocate a careful conservation of tradition, culture, and historical memory, a project which, ironically, requires them to appropriate the language and tactics of pre-WW2, nationalist, Imperialist Japan.It is here where Umi and Shun realise that they may in fact be brother and sister. The past, then, prevents the couple's present love affair. It taints, makes things impossible and exposes horrors which subsequent generations rather keep buried. Umi and Shun's inability to make sweet incestuous love is then mirrored to their own parents' rejection of conservative values; their mother and father came from upper and lower class families, and so are themselves emblematic of a love which was once forbidden.Of course no children's film is going to advocate incest. As such, "From Up On Poppy Hill" eventually reveals that Umi and Shun's consanguinity was just one big misunderstanding. The duo are granted love, but history remains a messy mine-field which threatens to explode and disrupt at any-time. Avoiding its pitfalls always means familiarising yourself with your forefathers."From Up On Poppy Hill" eschews the fantastical elements typical of Studio Ghibli productions. This is a simple but not simplistic melodrama, beautifully animated, at times heart-wrenching and filled with atmospheric locations. Like his father's work, Goro's lines are clean, his facial expressions subtle, his landscapes overly idealised and perhaps too steeped in nostalgia.8.5/10 – More very good, recent, Eastern animated films: "Whisper of the Heart", "Only Yesterday", "The Girl Who Leapt Through Time", "The Sky Crawlers", "The Secret World of Arriety", "The King of Pigs".