Hey, wait. Didn't I already review something like this with the exact same title? Yes, I did, but I reviewed the manga, which I can say with certainty is not only an absolutely amazing adaptation of the Mizuki Tsujimura novel, but a very well-thought out, wholesome, and heartwarming manga that tackles the hot topic of school bullying and its effects on children with sensitivity and grace. The movie aired in Japan back in December, and I managed to see it today, which I'm totally happy about. But having read the manga, while I do enjoy the movie for Lonely Castle In The Mirror, it does leave out quite a lot of important things, making it not as good as the manga or the novel, though that's not to say it isn't a good movie in its own right. The story is the same as the novel: The story centers on a young girl named Kokoro Anzai, who was so traumatized by a violent bullying incident that she refuses to go to school anymore. She spends what seems to be months confining herself to her house, and she doesn't feel like she can talk to her parents about her trauma, both because she doesn't want to relive it, and because she's afraid no one will take her seriously or believe her. One day, the life-sized mirror in her room glows with light, and when she touches it, Kokoro is pulled through into a fantastical castle, where a young girl in a wolf mask, calling herself the Wolf Queen, tells her that she and six other middle schoolers have one year to find the key that will grant the wish of whomever uses it. As Kokoro begins to get to know her fellow castle-visitors, she starts to think about her own situation in comparison to theirs…and what the price of a wish might actually be.

And yes, I still haven't read the original novel. I need to remedy that. But even without that knowledge, and having read the manga myself, it's easy to see that the Lonely Castle In The Mirror movie leaves out quite a bit of important parts of the kids' personalities and backgrounds, probably because the movie is a little under two hours and can't cover all of its material in that time. While I can understand leaving things out for the sake of time and pacing, the choices made here kind of both make the characters come off as a little less three-dimensional and result in a lot of the emotional moments not hit as hard when they're shown in the movie. For example, there's a subplot where Masamune is so disheartened by not seeing the group at school after they make their important promise, due to having been betrayed by his former friend group previously, that he doesn't come to the castle for several months, probably due to hitting rock bottom, leaving the other kids extremely worried about his welfare. This subplot is treated as a huge deal, and when Masamune does return, it's touted as an extremely heartwarming moment. But in the anime, the subplot is reduced to just a brief line of dialogue, and Masamune's return is given no fanfare at all. There's also a scene in the movie where Kokoro and her mother go to the mall, but in the manga, it comes right after Kokoro finally opens up about the bullying she went through, with her mother telling off her homeroom teacher for not even trying to hear Kokoro out. The trip to the mall is a huge milestone for Kokoro because it shows Kokoro's growth in that she's not only finally able to leave the house without feeling like the bullies will be out to get her, but it allows her to finally communicate with her mother and talk things out, which shows she feels safe in confiding in her when she felt she couldn't before. But the anime movie doesn't show Kokoro and her mother talking to each other, which results in their trip to the mall losing the significance that it had.

The movie also cuts out some smaller nuances to the characters, like Kokoro at first being dismissive of Masamune's love for RPGs and then apologizing for it later, and Aki's issues with her school volleyball team. So yeah, as a result of having to work with a more restricted format, Lonely Castle In The Mirror loses a lot of the depth and nuance that both the original and the manga had, resulting in both the characters and parts of the story coming off as a bit more shallow than the source material, which is inevitable for every adaptation of any media, really. That being said, the base premise is still the same as the novel and manga, following the exact same story beats and its depiction of bullying and the effects it has on children is still sensitive and respectful, even if a lot of the more emotional moments don't hit the same way as they do in the manga and novel. The fairy tale allusions are kept as well, and the movie also retains the ending twist, even if, again, it cuts out a lot of additional background as to how the twist happens and the backstory for the character it involves.

As far as how the movie fares from a technical standpoint, it's not a powerhouse in any way, but the animation itself is really well made. A-1 Pictures has always been really good with fluid character motion, with Lonely Castle In The Mirror being no exception. The castle has a great design, and the way its used for the backgrounds really make it feel like a place that's out of this world. I will admit, I'm more familiar with the characters' manga designs, but I do appreciate that the anime's renditions of then still manages to strike a good balance between being cartoony and realistic, and in contrast to the manga, the anime doesn't rely on exaggerated cartoony expressions or having the characters turn chibi sometimes. The soundtrack is also really nice, though it does try a little too hard at some points. The only thing I didn't like about the soundtrack is that there's this really random bit of hard rock guitar music that plays during what's supposed to be a tense, dramatic moment, and it just feels really jarring and out of place, taking me out of the moment. It really made me feel like it was trying way too hard to sell the drama when it could have relied on more subtle music. The voice acting is good too, but I have two complaints about it: The girls' voices sounded too similar, making them hard to tell apart at points, and I have to question why they made Mana Ashida use a lower pitched voice for a girl who looks and is said to be 6-7 years old in age when she's used a higher pitched, cuter voice for similar characters of that age in previous roles she had. It worked for when she was in Misaki no Mayoiga because she played a teenager, so it made sense for her to have a low pitched voice there, but I don't feel like the voice and the pitch she used for the Wolf Queen matched very well with the character. That's really about it in terms of critique I have for the film.

Overall, Lonely Castle In The Mirror as a movie loses a lot of the nuance and scaffolding the novel and manga had, but I think it's still a fairly serviceable adaptation. It's certainly not a bad adaptation in any way, as it could have been a whole lot worse. I'm just glad it turned out better than Bibliophile Princess at any rate. If you're interested in watching the movie, I'd recommend waiting until it gets shown in theaters or after the Blu-Ray comes out in the US, because while a fansubbed version just got released, the subtitles are really bad. Seriously, the fansubs make a lot of serious grammar mistakes, spell some characters' names wrong at times, and, most egregiously, outright refers to the Wolf Queen by the wrong gender! The hell?! So yeah, don't watch the fansubbed version, just wait for the theater showings and eventual Blu-Ray release, because those will have much better quality and will be more worth your time.