Hello ladies, peoples, and animals! It is I, the Arcane Reviewer! Here to bring you with another anime review. Now that I'm back In decided that I would like to actually do something special for all of you! The one year anniversary of when I started doing reviews it coming up so I thought why not give you guys a series a reviews for the next seven weeks of one of my all time favorite anime film series? That's right for the next seven weeks I'll be taking a look at the whole film series of, Kara no Kyoukai: The Garden of Sinners. So to start this series off right lets jump right into it with a review of the first film, Overlooking View. Let's begin shall we?
Story:
The story begins in the 1998 with our hero, Shiki Ryogi. A young woman with an amazing gift, the ability to see the death lines of anyone or anything. We also get to meet her two coworkers, Toko Aozaki and Mikiya Kokuto. They are a supernatural investigation group who, as you can imagine, deal with with anything that may seem to dwell into the surreal or supernatural side of things. They get a case that has been getting a lot of wind lately. Over at the abandoned Fujo building a group of young high school girls have been committing suicide unexpectedly. None of the girls seem to have anything that relates to one another and even more odd is the lack of a suicide note to at least explain why they did it. As Shiki inspects the building she finds that things are not all that they seem and something dark and twisted is happening inside that old forgotten building. Now the set up here is a bit odd, what do I mean? Well it's odd because the film does this really weird thing of name dropping characters, events, and certain places that all of the characters in the movie knows but not the audience. That's because the first four films in the Kara no Kyoukai series are actually out of order. So this film is in fact the 4th film in the series. Now while some may be a bit turned off by this I found it to make the film very interesting to sit through. Because know what's up and all of the major pieces plot development are put to the side of the audience but we know that we'll see what the film is talking about sooner or later. But for now we're just left in mystery, which may turn some off to the idea of watching these films. Also the subject material in this film may be a bit too heavy for some to handle. Suicide is a big subject matter in this film and it doesn't really pull any punches on how some of these characters feel about the notion of suicide and whether or not it's okay to take your own life. It's pretty heavy and some may feel a bit offended by the film but I personally thought they tackled the problem with taste and didn't really lean on what side was "right" or "wrong". They kept it very even and I thought that the film was pretty damn good with how they presented and commented on the issue of suicide.
Animation:
The fact that this is a Ufotable anime should already tell you already just how damn good this animation is. But just in case you need a reminder, this animation is amazing! Once again Ufotable shows off once why they are my favorite animation studio by just how jaw-droppingly beautiful this film looks. The design of the city is just so damn good and you get a lot of shot of the city just to give you an idea how big this place is. Not to mention the atmosphere that is created with the more darker and empty setting of the Fujo building as we get to look inside it as well. The animation during the two fight scenes are also done really good as well. You get a very claustrophobic and uneasy vibe from the first fight but then during the final fight you get this whole show of colors and fast-paced action that just never lets you go because of just how well it's animated. Character designs also look very simple, clean, and nice. But this is a Type-Moon product. These guys could make a redhead in jeans and a baseball shirt look iconic.......wait. Anyway animation is great and really gives a wide scope to the film.
Music:
Oh my God this music. This music! Yes the music is really good here well. The music, very much like the art and animation, set up a tone of somberness, loneliness, and overall dread. It's a hauntingly beautiful sound that set up a very eerie stage for the film. Not to mention that the music would become creepy and ghostly at the right moments to invoke a sense of fear or weariness. But the film doesn't go to over bored with it's music too. When the film needs to be more quiet and subtle the music would also get a downgrade in scale or no music would be used in certain scenes This gave the film more room to breath and not overuse any of it's tracks like a lot of anime does. The music is used very well and it's a treat to listen to. But then again what do you expect from Yuki Kajiura? Greatness that's what.
Characters:
This part is going to be a little tricky. Now while I already know what these characters go through I know that at a first time glance you're gonna be a bit lost. The characters here don't get a lot of development because this film is the 4th installment so their at the halfway point of their characters. So that means this film does very little to actually give a lot of in-depth development for these guys. But that doesn't mean that they come off as stale either. Shiki comes off as a harden badass who takes shit from no one but you can still tell that there is a softer side to her that we've yet to fully see and we can also tell that she has kind of relationship Mikiya. How deep this relationship goes though we don't fully know but you can tell that they are special to one another. Even if Shiki doesn't reveal it very much. Toko is another character we get a good idea of. She comes off as a very cool, collective, and smart individual. She clearly has a lot more going on then she leads on but for now she's just one cool boss that I personally would love to have. Mikiya is also kinda hard to get a point on. That's mainly due to the fact that he's not in the film a lot. But as stated before he has a very odd connection to Shiki and the moments that we see them together we get to see more of his character traits shine. He seems like a cool guy and we wait to see why he's so into to Shiki later down the films.
Overall:
Well in the end Overlooking View is a bit of an odd choice to open up the Kara no Kyoukai series. Now while there are six more films to go through it is understandable for some to be a bit lost after watching this. But even not fully knowing what's going on I still feel that this movie is a interesting first watch for the series and has enough plot and subtext that it can keep a person's interest long enough for the next installment: A Study in Murder-Part 1.
Arcane Reviews gives Kara no Kyoukai: Overlooking View an 8.5 out of 10.
You can watch "Kara no Kyoukai" on:
No legal streaming sites. Sorry.
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