I think we’ve all wanted to be someone else—I know I have. We move through our lives always having to be ourselves, with our life situations and our flaws. Sometimes it’s out of sheer curiosity. A lot of the time, though, it’s something deeper: a dissatisfaction with who you are, what your life turned out to be, an unexplainable sense of ennui. We get tired; we start to think we don’t belong, or that we belong somewhere else.

We also want to connect with other people. This is human nature: it sucks to be alone, at least for extended periods of time. For the most part we’re wired to connect with people, but for whatever reason it’s incredibly difficult. Getting to know someone isn’t so bad, once you get over the initial hump. Maybe you like the same TV show, or you make each other laugh, or you just like spending time together. Things change, though. Interests diverge, or spending time together is just a little harder than it used to be. Pauses in conversation become more noticeable. You go off to college or work, you move to different places, you have different lives. Sooner than later, you don’t know them, and trying to reconnect is one of the hardest things in the world.

You wish you could just know what it’s like to be that person you used to know, even just for a day.

To say Your Name. is beautiful is an understatement; from the sweeping vistas of stars and grassy fields, to the rack-focus closeups of ribbons and screens, to the feelings of desire and loss and being lost, beauty courses through this film. It could all potentially be too melodramatic, too emo even, but the well-crafted story and the consistent humor give the emotional tone depth beyond melancholy. And the key turn midway through the film elevates it to something greater.

On my first viewing, I didn’t really understand why the movie had an anime series-style opening theme; it was distracting, and seemed like an obligation to its format. It made much more sense on rewatch, though, glimpsing Taki and Mitsuha growing and diverging far before it happens, as an inevitability. At first, they get to know each other on an incredibly intimate level, through the body swapping trope the film uses and subverts viewers’ expectations of. They fall in love with each other, but not solely on a romantic level; they love who the other person is as a human being, and that they exist. When their bond is severed, there are plot reasons for it, but it also illustrates how people just stop connecting. And years later, when they finally do reconnect, they can’t just pick up from where they left off. They have to start over, even having to learn each other’s names again. At least they get that chance.