Tatsuki Fujimoto is one of the most thrilling mangakas of the present day, principally known for his works of action-driven supernatural scenes, such as Fire Punch and particularly his hit work Chainsaw Man, which has taken over the Animanga community with manic force, particularly since its anime release. Fujimoto’s later work Look Back is a one-shot manga, notably deviating from his more famous supernatural works, as it shifts to a more grounded narrative. Set in an elementary school, it departs from his usual abstract plots for an intimate story, following two girls who unexpectedly develop a friendship by merging their artistic talents in pursuit of a shared professional goal. The story delves into themes of friendship, rivalry, dreams, and hinted Sapphic love. Look Back has been recently adapted into a 58-minute animated film of the same name, produced by Studio Durian. This release has solidified Fujimoto’s reputation as a versatile storyteller of complex emotional depth, and of course, an extraordinary artist.━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━So, as an animator, I really wanted to focus on her efforts and to show them, and also make it easy to see that she is working hard.━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━

The plot follows young student Fujino aspiring to be a mangaka, she is filled with arrogant confidence as she entertains her classmates with her manga panels she submits to the school paper. This self-assurance is then rattled when faced with a rival artist, Kyomoto, a reclusive yet talented student whose artistic ability eclipses her own with its realistic landscapes. With this new competition and discouragement from friends, Fujino feels discouraged and therefore loses her passion for drawing - until fate brings the two girls together. Their unexpected friendship blossoms as they start to work together into adulthood with their shared creative dreams, merging Fujino’s stylistic character designs with Kyomoto’s background work.

The story draws heavily from Fujimoto’s personal experiences as an artist. Afterall, the combination of Fujino and Kyomoto’s name does spell out Fujimoto; the original creator was intent on communicating the experiences of an artist in a world of tragedy. The catalyst for Look Back’s inspiration was following the earthquake of Tohoku in 2011; Fujimoto and his team had lost the motivation to draw and then questioned the importance of art in this world. That feeling of powerlessness was portrayed well as a vehicle in these characters’ journeys, following the protagonists finding their purpose. Once Fujino does get back to drawing, it is all that she devotes her time to.

━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━But as an animator, I was able to animate it, and as a director, I was able to control the flow and the direction of the story. I think every single experience I've had in the past 20 years came in handy when I worked on this film.━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━

The director of the film, Kiyotaka Oshiyama, is known to have previously assisted with the key animation of several notable works, such as Studio Ghibli’s The Boy and the Heron. Studio Durian is relatively new with a tight-knit team, and so Oshiyama had a very hands-on approach with the film, having directed, storyboarded and drawn many of the film’s keyframes. Due to Oshiyama’s vast experience in the animation industry, he felt confident in having so much control over the film, which was evident with its natural flow, fitted compactly within the 58-minute constraint. Oshiyama was very particular about using movement over any other techniques to convey intense emotions; exaggerations and repeated scenes are used when exploring struggles with ambition, as well as the intensity of the girls’ friendship. An example of this is a scene where there was a focus on the girls’ holding hands; It was extended longer than anything the manga showed to place emphasis on their intimate bond. Another detail was influenced by Fujimoto himself: When meeting the original creator, Oshiyama noticed Fujimoto’s manner of his of massaging between his eyebrows. Noticing this, the director decided to incorporate this gesture into Fujino’s character, further grounding her portrayal as someone immersed in her craft. Its cinematography was a clever way of evidencing the importance of art in the story.

It was adapted beautifully, with its cinematography, vibrant voice casting and, most notably, its sound design. When there was lacking dialogue, it made up with emotive music and subtle audio details such as the pencil scratching on paper, bringing the focus to the driving motif of the film – art and creation. It was a thoroughly immersive experience, bringing homage to the importance of art and its intimate human connections. With its stirring animation and emotional depth, Look Back stands as a testament to Fujimoto’s original craft and Oshiyama’s vision.

A stirring debut of Studio Durian, Look Back is a heartfelt and visually stunning tribute to the art of creation. It is a certain must-watch for those who appreciate mature animated works and poignant storytelling.