Ohayo (Good Morning)

"Good Morning" is an incredible, realistic, and well-crafted short film from both a narrative and visual perspective. With just a minute of duration, what you see is pure magic, a love for the short film genre, animation, anime, and its own series.

Satoshi Kon once again dazzles with his incredible ingenuity and ability to create stories that are not just original, but brilliant. His style, approach, and significance were captured in 60 seconds, giving a little more of his great legacy.

Among the aspects of this short film, its animation is phenomenal. With a level of detail, the line work, the sequences of movements, the color tones, and that characteristic way of making the images super realistic add a lot to this short. One can also add that soundtrack that accompanies the sequences of the scenes seen on screen at all times, providing that focus on our protagonist and creating a bond with the viewer.

The reality depicted in "Good Morning" is vital from the perspective of maturity, sacrifice, struggle, the "let's go, we can do it" spirit, routine, and it can even be seen from another perspective such as fatigue, loneliness, sadness, among others. That reflective message about the routine ups and downs of people is fundamental, hitting the mark because it happens more than we think. The work routine combined with our minds makes this short a gem.

Without a doubt, any viewer would see themselves reflected on screen; nevertheless, in the end, there is a surge of joy and hope for a new day.

This may only be a one minute short film, and yet it carries a lot of significance when looking at the career of Satoshi Kon. He died of pancreatic cancer in 2010 and finished his last feature, Paprika, in 2007. But in the intervening years (aside from another film, The Dream Machine, that remains uncompleted) he made this, 'Good Morning', for a Japanese TV show. Why he contributed it, I have no idea. But it has a very simple concept - almost what you might expect in a student film - and executed flawlessly.

It's the ideal short film in a way as you see a person getting ready to start their day (and including a fluid animation style that was par for the course for Kon by this time), and the woman subject is a double of herself following her around. So you get to see this 'real' person and then the 'fake' following her, as if it's the part of her that isn't really ready to get started with the day, or is an apparition. And yet it's still a story told and every frame seems lovingly crafted, without a moment missed to make something graceful in how the woman moves despite (or because of) her sluggish-getting-ready-for-the-day routine.