Josee, The Tiger And The Fish: Review

This movie, for me, is something which is rare to find. A heartfelt story about love, despair, friendship and human emotions in general. It is a simple romance, but executed perfectly. I needed this movie, something wholesome like this and I guess you need it too!

Here I will review the anime movie, Josee, The Tiger and The Fish, giving my honest opinions about it. I understand you can have different opinions and it's perfectly fine. This is based on my personal experience.

This review is entirely spoiler-free.

Josee, The Tiger and The Fish revolves around our two main characters - Tsuneo Suzukawa, who is a college student working part time, especially in a diving club, to collect money so that he can fulfill his dreams one day; one chance encounter lets him meet a young girl called Josee, who is always bound to a wheelchair as she cannot walk. Tsuneo later accepts a job from her grandmother to be her caretaker, and thus their stories begin.

The difficulties people face in achieving their dreams is highlighted from the beginning. Sometimes people have to give up on them, and the story does a good job in making us realize how it feels to experience something like that. It teaches us, in various ways, not to give up on our dreams, no matter what happens. Well, the story can be depressing at times too, but it is worth it for the overall one. The ending was satisfactory and wrapped up the movie pretty good.

The story is rather simple, but there is no saying that simple stories cannot be great. This story was engaging, being heartbreaking at times (I remember praying to have a good ending), and makes us empathize with the characters. The adventures of Josee and Tsuneo start - she had not gone out from her home for a very long time, thus some of the outside experiences being first for her. Her reactions are priceless. Tsuneo does his best to help her, although at times they start quarreling with each other, but amends are made quickly. They realize each others' importance soon.

It did not try to convey the stories of other characters and this was good. The story only followed their experiences, diving into side ones only when needed. The execution of the story is what makes it good. We have come across such stories before, but this one strengthened the fact that sometimes simplicity can be better than complex storylines.

The main characters, Tsuneo and Josee, are developed excellently, as this movie solely followed their lives. For a romance to work, this amount of development is needed. Taking into account the struggles faced by both of them, progress is made and this makes us connect with the characters. It feels strange how you can connect with fictional characters, and the movie does it spectacularly. A fiction can be close to our hearts if we feel the characters' emotions and thankfully, it came close to mine.

Other supporting characters were relevant except the one of Mai Ninomiya, whose plotline felt irrelevant to me - the one thing she does is to show us the difference between selfish and selfless love. Overall, the character development was good and made me feel everything which was going on. We can see the changes in a character distinctly.

The music in this anime movie was very good. Music can stir our emotions making us feel the happiness and pain of a character, and this was exactly it. The score was well done, amplifying the emotions in the movie.

The songs in the movie performed by Eve were very good (music tastes differ from one person to another) and I personally liked them, especially Shinkai. Eve's voice felt a perfect match for this one. Overall, the music resonated with me and helped in further improving my experience.

This is another category in which the movie shines once again. In case of a work of this medium, animation can make or break it. In this case however, animation by Studio Bones was brilliant and you have to watch the movie yourself in order to appreciate what I am saying.

The scenes describing nature were picturesque, and the character animations were good. There are some scenes of painting and looking at them too, it made me amazed. The studio did a lot of work in this one, without any shortcuts and this makes the movie very charming and worthwhile.

A simple yet beautiful story of love and despair, this movie lived up to my expectations and was indeed a joy to watch. This is an emotional rollercoaster, filled with moments of happiness and sadness alike, and is a ride worth taking if you like the romance genre. Just don't expect too much from this one, and believe me, you might as well like it very much, I certainly hope so.

We have seen many complex stories, so sometimes it feels good to watch something wholesome like this. The characters were likeable, the story was good, the execution was fantastic, the music was touching and the animation was great. This is a good movie to watch if you want to see something like it.

I hope my review was helpful. Thank you for reading. Like always, keep watching anime and be happy.

[All images are obtained from Google.]

Written by: Sekhar08
September 3, 2021