SteveFreeling

Let's make one thing clear right off the bat: Your Name is one of my favorite movies. It's one I can throw into my Blu-ray player any time. Rising filmmaker Makoto Shinkai's animated summer blockbuster has earned a reputation as one of the best of its kind, exploring themes of love, loss, abandonment, and the human condition through a perhaps unusual, but no less effective, sci-fi/fantasy lens. With its stunning animation, gripping storytelling, likable characters, faultless voice acting (in both English and Japanese), and incredible RADWIMPS musical score and songs, this lovingly crafted film isn't one to... See full review

I'll never forget October 28, 2018, for two reasons. The first is that it was my 20th birthday. The second is that it's the day I went to see a movie. It was a movie I already owned on Blu-ray and had seen several times, but that couldn't dull my enthusiasm. The movie in question was, of course, Hayao Miyazaki's Spirited Away, a film notable for being not only the only piece of Japanese animation but also the only hand-drawn animated film to win an Academy Award for Best Animated Feature. More than that, Spirited Away is that rare Oscar winner that actually lives up to its hype. Miyazaki has crafted an ode... See full review

Nausicaä of the Valley of the Wind is one of my favorite movies. I can always throw it into my Blu-ray player after a crappy day and come away satisfied after each viewing. Hayao Miyazaki has lovingly crafted an uplifting, poignant, and emotionally satisfying film, a film that examines the human condition at both its best and its worst, both the compassion and selflessness we're capable of and the anger and arrogance that cause some of us to commit the worst acts against our fellow man. On top of this, it's all so very relevant some 35 years (whoa!) after the film first arrived in Japanese... See full review

Some films simply transcend the border of what's on the surface. Legendary Japanese animator Hayao Miyazaki's Castle in the Sky (known as Laputa: Castle in the Sky internationally) is such a film. Miyazaki has crafted a fun and exciting adventure film that also doubles as an emotionally satisfying journey into the human condition, a film that meditates on love, compassion, friendship, selflessness, and what really determines one's worth. The result is my favorite film produced under the Studio Ghibli banner, only bested by Nausicaä of the Valley of the Wind for the top... See full review

Let's make one thing clear right off the bat: this review is gonna be positive. Akira is not only my favorite anime but my favorite animated film bar none and one of my favorite films in general. Katsuhiro Otomo has crafted an animated sci-fi actioner for adults that's above reproach as a film, a rarity since the vast majority of "adult" animation fails miserably by relying on dopey sex jokes and idiotic plot rather than solid storytelling and likable characters. Otomo's film weaves together themes of friendship, honor, betrayal, the deadly consequences of playing God, gang war... See full review