Pompo the Cinefile is a movie that attempts to dispense meaningful messages, but didn’t hit the mark for me. First off, there are a few scenes that embody the idea that projects are a group endeavor where everyone’s input is important. Second, the most impactful part of the movie involves not settling for “good enough” and fully realizing your visions. Finally, it highlights the importance of letting go of things despite how difficult it is. For what it’s worth, I think that these are very good messages that the plot of making a movie facilitates very well.

However, I think the movie ends up completely shooting itself in the foot and disqualifying them. The whole third act of the film weirdly starts glorifying crunch. Of course we live in a depressing time where that’s how industries are, but this is definitely no satire of it. As a result, the whole feel-good team effort disappears immediately once the sole protagonist starts editing the film AND “don’t settle for less” unintentionally goes from inspiring to perverse.

Despite Pompo being the name of the film, the movie focuses on her subordinate Gene being the director of the film. I did not care for Gene. He’s a film-buff who has the know-how to direct a movie, but he’s a spineless wimp who needs help getting the confidence to do so. The potential was there to make him a character I’d root for. Instead, the movie paints him as pathetic in a way that I found obnoxious instead of cute. The gratuitous amount of the “dark eye bags” always present on his design certainly didn’t help. I think he was designed for a specific demographic to relate to and feel good about — a demographic I’m not in.

Pompo, the girl featured in the title of the film, was much more of a side character than you would expect. I feel like she was supposed to act as a mentor for Gene (and her design was meant to be a silly juxtaposition of that), but I think her grandfather fulfilled that role more. It certainly didn’t help that her first piece of advice as a mentor was “Only people who have suffered are creative”. I think this had the intention of giving a boost to viewers saddled with hardships, but it’s such an extreme take to start off on that it made her hard to take seriously. Mostly she was there to be cute, which I think they succeeded in doing at least.

As an aside, the movie spends a bit of time pointing out that you have to make a movie trailer with the idea of misdirection to get the audience interested. I think they were trying to be clever by doing that with Pompo the Cinefile itself and making the cute girl the title of it while giving her the most prominence on the poster. If the movie was actually about being satirical about the movie industry then I would consider this move to be a stroke of comedic genius. But since the movie is actually about propping movies up, pulling this move feels so discordant. This and the aforementioned “Gene demographic” idea make the movie feel somewhat fabricated.

Anyway, to get back to the characters, Nathalie was my favorite. Unfortunately, her whole buildup of wanting to be in movie and her cute, endearing personality barely got highlighted. Obviously this is Gene’s story, but it’s disappointing that they made a character with so much more charm and a even main-character-worthy backstory, then made her merely a side character. It’s especially odd when Mystia fulfills the exact same role of “side character actress” but with the appropriate amount of screen time for the role.

Alan was such a weird character because he basically shows up halfway through. Furthermore, his one big scene of needing to get investors for the movie could’ve been an interesting glance into what goes into that, but it instead devolves into cartoonish absurdity. I cannot see that scene being taken seriously, which is especially damning because by that point the movie swaps its mood from lighthearted to solemn.

A part of me feels bad because the reason I was interested in this movie was hearing that it was inspiring and emotional. I don't want to be punching down on people who might've genuinely been lifted up by it. However, I don’t think the movie did a good job of portraying its messages. Instead it came off as either boring, asinine, or tone-deaf to me. Perhaps if you’re a movie buff then the subject matter might be interesting enough, but otherwise I can’t reliably recommend it.