Review | Berlin 2023: Suzume movie review – fantastical coming-of-age tale from Japanese animation director Makoto Shinkai is beguiling for young and old
- Inspired by the deadly 2011 Tohoku earthquake and tsunami that struck Japan, Suzume sees its titular character unwittingly trigger a disaster
- A stranger is turned into a three-legged stool by a talking cat, and she tries to help reverse this in a film skilfully animated and fabulous to look at
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4/5 stars
Japanese director Makoto Shinkai delivers another beguiling animation in Suzume, a film that plays equally well for young and old.
Featured in competition at this year’s Berlin International Film Festival – an honour it well deserves – Suzume is inspired by the devastating Tohoku earthquake and tsunami that struck northeast Honshu island in Japan in 2011.
Weaving fantasy elements into a contemporary story, one that takes audiences on a picaresque journey around Japan, Shinkai creates yet another smart, sassy look at the world around us.
One of Shinkai’s great skills, however, is building an entertaining storyline around heavyweight topics, so it doesn’t feel like you’re being served up a lecture.
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So it goes for Suzume, the story of a 17-year-old girl living in Kyushu, southern Japan. Her family has already known disaster, and Suzume (voiced by Nanoka Hara) knows grief all too well.
One day, she passes a handsome stranger, named Souta (Hokuto Matsumura), who is on a mission. “Am I totally stalking him right now?” she asks, while following him.
Souta is looking for a door, standing in just its frame in the middle of a ruined glass dome. When Suzume touches the doorknob, she unleashes a natural disaster, a red gush of energy that looks like the Smoke Monster from TV show Lost.
Things really start to get strange when they encounter a talking cat named Daijin, who turns Souta into a three-legged chair (which still can speak and waddle along, like a demented tripod).
And so begins her trip, as she tries to help Souta return to his human form, initially tracking the mischievous Daijin via his appearances on Instagram.
Further doors, meanwhile, open across Japan, as red earthquake warnings flash up on people’s phones and disaster edges ever closer.
Terms such as “keystones” and “The Ever-After” (which sounds like the alternate dimension The Upside Down in Netflix show Stranger Things) are bandied about, while Suzume is told: “You’re like a wizard, full of secrets.”
For all the film’s fantastical elements, Shinkai grounds it in a coming-of-age tale that will have you rooting for the tender-aged heroine. Skilfully animated, with rich visuals throughout, it’s fabulous to look at.
“This world is not for the ordinary,” we’re told. The same can be said about Suzume.
