I stumbled upon Kase-san and Morning Glories after watching an anime from the same director, Otherside Picnic, which I liked a lot.
I didn't expect much as lesbian relationships are usually depicted in quite a disappointing way in anime. I was, as such, quite surprised when the movie quite literally opens with them being girlfriends.
At no point is it depicted as questionable, or weird. At no point is their love considered condemnable because they're both girls.
The whole movie is extremely soft. It feels warm and comforting, just like a cool breeze in summer. The two characters are very different but their love for each other seeps through the screen to tickle your heart, and their relationship is at all time pictured as innocent, sweet, and incredibly lovely.
I expected either the standard cliché of yuri or the insulting depiction that can sometimes be made but I just stumbled upon something that made me feel, as a lesbian, very emotional. Those fifty minutes were a breath of fresh air, a tingle of hope that lesbian relationships in anime can be treated as more than a fetish or an abnormal thing. A hope that we can see more characters that are in love with each other and just happened to both be women.
I kept jumping up and down my seat at them being absolutely adorable towards each other, recognizing some ways I used to be as a teenager, some ways I still am, in how expressive pure love can be.
It's hard to even talk about how the movie looks, or how good the sound was, because of just how secondary all of this is to the main aspect of this movie. It's before all else, an adorable love story. One that depicts it with lovely animation, a great choice in colors, and a sound design that backs everything up.
The only thing really I could say negatively about this movie is that I was incredibly sad it ended. We don't have enough depictions in anime of a lesbian relationship. It's always some flirting around, maybe some kissing here and there, some unsaid feelings and hidden handholding, but this was a clear, loud, and loving relationship, and I so, so wish there was more of it. I want to watch their whole story unfold, I want to see more of those warm feelings of love and care for each other.
I really hope that this movie can be a step forward towards anime as a whole being more open and treating lesbians not as a fetish for men to look at, not as something forbidden and shameful, but as a type of relationship to be respected and that can be made into a touching, lovely story like this one.
If you're a lesbian, or a sapphic in general, please watch this movie. You will not be disappointed. If you're not... please watch this movie. It's still incredibly good outside of being relatable, and hopefully it will bring more understanding to people.