The film follows our heroine Violet and the exploits of the CH Postal Company, in a similar format to the show and earlier film. Violet writes letters, we learn about the sad stories of her clients, the usual. The appearance of the major brings in a break to the routine of things, and becomes the focal point of the second half of the film. I was expecting a more in-depth exploration of Violet and the major’s relationship once he came into the picture, but sadly most of their relationship is presented as flashbacks in an effort to refresh our memories (and save on budget?). That’s not to say we didn’t get to learn plenty about the Major, he's not on screen for a huge amount but he did receive a fair amount of character development.
The interactions with Violet’s ‘client’ and other character moments in the film aren’t hurried and generally presented at a good pace, as we now have a long runtime to proceed through them in a satisfactory manner. The overall ‘message’ the film presented (importance of spending time with loved ones etc.) was nothing new, but it worked. The art and animation were gorgeous. I think everyone knows the quality Kyoto commits to but wow, it really was impressive to watch. I don’t think there was a single frame that wasn’t lovely to look at.
There were a number of times when I thought things could have moved on a bit faster, the pacing never dragged (and again, it was better than the TV show) but a couple of scenes lingered for a little too long. Several emotional scenes were for a lack of a better term, ham-fisted. Hell, the director may as well have shown a title card with ‘you can cry now!’. Subtlety goes a long way folks.
I have two major complaints about this film. The first is that I didn't think the supporting cast's stories were wrapped up at all. A few were, but the ‘main’ supporting cast (the workers at the Postal Company) I mean what happened to them? There was no resolution, it’s the same for the characters introduced in 'Eternity and the Auto Memory Doll'. We get a full film that's dedicated solely to them and we don't even see them at all during the runtime of this.
My main complaint with this film was at how overbearing the music was. My God. In every scene that was remotely emotional the grating score was so loud and overly dramatic it overpowered the dialogue and veered very close to removing all the impact of sensitive scenes. I didn't feel like I was watching a touching drama that made me want to cry, at times I thought I was watching a tacky melodrama. Someone should have told the composer/director: 'Hey, maybe we should tone this down a bit?'. I know it’s similar to how it is in the TV show, but in a feature length movie its brunt was far worse. Thankfully, at the most pivotal scene in the film the soundtrack was nowhere to be seen (at least).
Complaints aside, I did enjoy the film and it wrapped up Violet's story well. I was also SO GLAD they didn't rush the
Oh, I forgot to mention: I was one of the lucky folks who watched this during its one day only run in Ireland in a 'packed' cinema. And by packed, I mean there was barely 20 other people there as that was the maximum allowed. Thanks Coronavirus!
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