Sennen Joyuu

Millennium Actress is something that can easily be called great. It is outwardly audacious and seemingly gorgeous in nature.

Though to be frank, Millennium Actress rather comes across as something that would be praised as long as the aesthetics are nice, the plot is a little bit convoluted and that it is directed by Satoshi Kon. By no means do I utter this statement as an insult to sir Kon or an accusation to the movie’s fans. This is just a statement that I genuinely believe after gathering all my experience and coming to the conclusion: its fans generally are completely oblivious of the movie’s criticisms, and their belief that this movie is an animation magnum opus will not change due to the mentioned reasons. Certainly, my aim is not to change people’s mind but be as objective as possible so as to judge this fairly. I will keep this review short.

The story is… okay. It’s just average really, and, if I should be honest, has been recycled quite a lot in Hollywood that I see no point in trying to magnify it. It’s just not special, but it however has a heart. I can clearly see where they were trying to go with, and so the intention is clear and rightfully consistent throughout. This means that the movie is predictable and has virtually nothing to anticipate other than “does the actress meet her love?”, which is kind of a dull story cornered to two sides of a coin; but, it is still a movie that feels complete regardless. And certainly, the intent of paying homage to Japanese cinema is no good excuse for an average story, though it’s still nice and somewhat exciting to witness the genuine affection of Kon towards such rich cinema history.

The execution of the story is arguably poor. As thin and uninspiring as the story is, the execution barely does anything to embrace it (unlike in Tokyo Godfathers). To be fair, all the director does for the movie is dragging this nonexistent storyline for an hour and a half. And for this reason befalls the second problem, the expendable tanglement of narration. For a story with barely any philosophical weight or plot development, the convoluted narrative is just absolutely pretentious. “Oh but it’s gorgeous, and it merges reality and memories…” well reasonably, fair enough. But I would like to ask you, “What’s the point?”. While acknowledging that such emergence goes to show how by the end of the actress’ life, she can recall the events so vividly and can’t differentiate what’s real and what’s not; yet forasmuch as the emergence solely considers her lifetime acting career, it gives the audience no insights or depth other than the actress’ very simplistically discernible state of mind. This would have been so much more thematically powerful if it had included an actual emphasis, and that the acting career emergence didn’t just take up the whole second half for nothing. When an idea is so superficial and yet being told so grandiosely, it will inevitably give the impression of being overly indulgent. Unlike other reviewers, to me, the complexity (or should I even call it like that, because it’s just convoluted, not complex) in this movie has no depth or thematic ideas.

The characters are fine. They are fun and likable enough to lead the audience till the end, but none of them were even remotely profound or memorable. The dialogues are honestly so corny. I could forgive everything these hombres verbalize throughout the movie, but for the last line, I simply couldn’t. It’s just melodramatic and corny and foreseeable. Unforgivable.

The tone is dexterously framed by a clearly talented director. Kon knows when we should have a moment of comedic relief, or when one should expect an emotional impact. And so, thanks to the tone, the story seems much more seamless and smooth while watching. Still, rethinking about it, this doesn’t change the fact that this movie is poorly crafted.

All that aside, we have an absolutely amazing audiovisual piece of art. The animation is simply flawless and the art is not your typical degenerate garbage (not trying to sound disrespectful, my point is it looks mature and visually intriguing). The music is really good and is generally well used. I have nothing to complain about the production value and that I am more than enthusiastic to praise this truly astounding audiovisual spectacle. I can rest assured anyone who watches this movie would concur.

That said, conclusively this movie, albeit aesthetically merited, is subpar in almost every way. Satoshi Kon is definitely not a hax fraud, however refutably overrated, for he has demonstrated his genuine competence in composing his own coups such as Perfect Blue or Tokyo Godfathers, and even glimpses of greatness here and there in Millennium Actress. Nevertheless, with over-indulgence in style and the uncalled-for narrative bafflement, Millennium Actress has become his weakest work that I’ve experienced so far. Mind you, this movie used to hold a 10 on my list for quite some time, so I think I could somewhat discern the mindset of conservatively marveling this movie. Yet have I verily changed to thus give my sincere final verdict upon this movie: How corny.