GKids
One thing to know about me is that I am particular about my animation, especially children’s animation. I am an old fashioned snob, turning down my nose at lower quality fare. Another thing to know is that in general I am hard to please when it comes to anime or Japanese animation. But occasionally things really stand out, like last year’s Your Name, and sometimes a movies is simply good enough.
Lu Over the Wall is a Japanese animated movie directed and co-written by Masaaki Yuasa. The movie takes place in the coastal town of Hinashi, where young Kai Ashimoto lives with his father and grandfather in the aftermath of his parents’ divorce. This aspect of the story is lightly touched on, barely hinted at, and mostly unimportant to the movie, to its minor detriment.
Kai is a loner, with no friends (by choice it seems), and with one creative outlet: writing songs. After one of his songs is heard by people from his class, he gets approached by two friends, a frenetically energetic girl Yuho and overly excited boy Kunio asking to join their band ‘SEIREN’. This is a play on words because it just so happens that there is an old legend about merfolk near the town and it’s a big part of local culture, including having a yearly ‘merfolk’ themed festival.
Yuho and Kunio have their own parent issues, dealing with people in high levels in the town and perhaps not super supportive of their artistic dreams. But when Kai plays his music with Yu, a mysterious ‘ningyo’ (a kind of mermaid like creature) appears, magically able to manipulate the water and make people dance as she sings.
This ningyo instantly connects with Kai, calling herself Lu and trying over and over to sing with him and his music. As the yearly festival draws nearer and the gang plans to play there, tensions increase as weird things start to occur and people remember half-forgotten legends about dangerous merfolk and how they might destroy everything.
One of the great strengths of this movie is how it embraces very weird style choices, and gets legitimately trippy at times. The design of Lu is odd but cute in a fun sort of off-putting way, and there are some nice moments of connection and sentiment hidden in this fast-paced, breakneck, nutty movie.
The movie descends in a bizarre medley of silliness and intense mixes of sight and sound, in a way that is likely too much for younger children. There is a unique style though, a visual flair that is different from most other children’s anime of this type, drawing inspiration from many different styles. The voice acting is decent enough, but the true strength of the movie is the heart at the center of its nonstop craziness.
It’s not something that will echo throughout the ages, but it’s something that makes me wonder what’s next for the director, what might truly be great.
Lu Over the Wall has a run time of 1 hours 47 minutes and is rated PG for some peril and thematic elements.
Share this post
