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Brave Story (2006) Review

Anime, Movies

Story and Plot
Brave Story is based on an original manga by Miyuki Miyabe adapted by Gonzo Digimation. This is Gonzo’s latest foray in producing a full feature length animation. Their previous feature, Origins – Spirits of the Past, was touted as a breakthrough in terms of animation and production design but sadly suffers from a weak plot that did not carry well past the audience. Brave Story on the other hand, plays it safe and as the movie is targeted towards a younger audience, the plot is simplified but still provides viewers with a memorable and adventurous outing.

The story tells of a young boy by the name of Wataru who’s facing difficulty in his family affairs. His father has left the family and shortly after that, his mom fell terribly ill. Prior to these events, he was acquainted with a new student, Mitsuru, whom he had saved from some school bullies. Mitsuru in return, told him of a mysterious gateway that leads to another world called the Vision. It is said that there is a Goddess of Fortune that will grant you one wish should you complete your journey in that world.

Unable to face the realities at home, Wataru opens the gateway to Vision in order to change his destiny. Upon arriving at Vision, Wataru is tasked with completing a series of puzzles, after which he is given the rank of a novice hero along with a sword which requires 5 gems to be collected before one can meet the Goddess of Fortune. And so the adventure begins much like many Japanese RPGs that we’re familiar with. Wataru begins as an innocent young child and as he journeys through the world of Vision, he gains courage and forges friendships with his honesty and sense of justice. He is soon joined by Ki-Kima from a lizard tribe and Miina and half-human half-cat circus performer.

As they travel to collect the other gems across the world, Wataru soon crosses path with Mitsuru. It was then revealed that Mitsuru has been on a destructive rampage to retrieve the gems at all costs even wiping out an entire village at one point. Unable to convince him to change his ways, Wataru was determined to stop Mitsuru by beating him at collecting the gems. The story throws in some interesting dilemma faced by the protagonist with the general theme of self sacrifice above all else. Its not everyday that you see an anime geared for kids that features family problems and death. Revealing any more of the story would spoil the fun, but I can tell you that the story has its emotional, sad and happy moments.

My Thoughts
Visually, Brave Story is beautiful film with Gonzo’s expertise in CGI effects in all of their productions clearly showing in this movie. The effects were used seamlessly but there are some obvious traces of budget cuts in a few areas of the animation though. Character design is clean and simple which I suppose is acceptable for a kids affair.

The score by Juno Reactor was really engaging and really brings up the atmosphere during a few of the key sequences in the movie. I had a lot of fun watching Brave Story. Its simplistic plot is easy to digest and has a feel good factor despite the dark overtones of the problems faced by both of the main characters. Its been a long time since I’ve watched a decent adventure anime feature film with Ghibli Studio’s most recent release of Tales from the Earthsea being quite a let down for me. Despite having a few shortcomings of having a little simplistic plot and some animation quality issues, I’d still recommend Brave Story to anyone looking for an adventurous getaway.

Genres: Adventure, Fantasy
Running time: 112 minutes
Age rating: Teenagers

Director: Koichi Chigira
Script: Ichiro Okouchi
Music: Juno Reactor
Character Design: Yuriko Chiba
Original Novel: Miyuki Miyabe
Producer:
Daisuke Sekiguchi
Hiroyoshi Koiwai
Koji Kajita

Rating:

Gonzo Official Website (English)

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