Îhatôbu gensô: KENjI no haru

Spring and Chaos is an astonishing movie for three reasons. The first one is the apparent antagonism between the form and the substance, a poetry writer biography in a "funny animal" story such as The Aristocats... The second one is the gap between a commercial manga cartoon style and a non figurative painting style with strobe light effect editing, rough draft cartoon sequences and even word's keying ! Last but not least is the strength of the poetical atmosphere that proceeds from all these apparent discrepancies thanks to a subtle script, a perfectly chiseled dialogue and a strong screen presence of main characters.

I never thought I'd say this about a biopic, but there is a near over-abundance of characterization (especially concerning Kenji Miyazawa's emotions) and too little on the literal occurrences in his life--by the end, I'm not sure if he dies (he's supposed to), or if his sister finally dies (she's supposed to), or if the director spent a little too much time on the Galactic Railroad (that's an inside joke, in case you missed it--Miyazawa wrote a children's book called Night on the Galactic Railroad). However, this glimpse inside the mind of a writer who "sketched poetry and fairy tales from his imagination" is very intelligent, creative, entertaining, and emotionally powerful.

All this despite the fact that everyone is animated as animals (like in many of Miyazawa's stories).

Some of the visuals are truly astounding, especially considering that it was a made for TV movie. Seriously, some of them (like the sequence with birds trailing blue light) rival parts of Fantasia. However, I still can't stand computer animation when it is mixed with cel animation. The CGI trains are horribly obvious--even more so than the Anastasia train.

8/10

If you are looking for the usual storytelling in this film or a biography conveyed with obsequiousness of a certain great man, then you will probably be disappointed.

Loneliness, misunderstanding of others, the need to do things that are disgusting to you in order to earn your living, losses, mistakes, self-loathing and a feeling of meaninglessness - this is what the poet imagines life to be. How to turn it into poetry? Nothing will change, no matter what you do, the gears of the mechanism of the Universe are spinning, grinding our lives and efforts, taking those who are dear to us far away, to where we will never meet again... See what others cannot see and try to capture it, try to help people when they laugh at you and do not understand you, limit yourself in everything that is not related to the work of your life, direct every step and every thought towards a better future for everyone - let everyone call me a fool, let them try to interfere with me, let everything I do be abandoned and forgotten.

This is the kind of person this movie is about. His impressive determination is conveyed through a number of complex metaphors and symbolisms.

A very interesting piece of art, but definitely not for everyone.

Talk about being boring!

I got this expecting a fascinating insight into the life of the man who wrote the mythical Night on the Galactic Railroad. I expected to see crazy stories and hijinks of an eccentric man and to discover his inspirations for such bizarre material. Boy, was I wrong.

Spring and Chaos is mostly boring with only sporadic moments of innovative animation. It's certainly nothing to write home about and nowhere near as good as NOTGR which is something that I suggest you watch instead. Leave this bore alone. If you absolutely MUST see then either rent it or find it somewhere cheap. Do not pay top dollar.

I'll make this brief. This was a joy to watch. It may or may not have been more effective if the characters had resembled their real life counterparts, but aside from this minor observation I found the fantasy animal characters to be most enjoyable. The visuals were most stunning except for the second-rate CG scenes, which could have been left out. I dislike computer generated animation anyways, it defeats the purpose of a biopic such as this one. Watch it, you will appreciate it too!