Tokyo Godfathers | Toru Emori, Yoshiaki Umegaki | Redemption Where You Can Find It

Tokyo Godfathers | Toru Emori, Yoshiaki Umegaki | Surpsisingly good - more than 5 stars

DVDs:

Tokyo Godfathers

	Tokyo Godfathers Toru Emori, Yoshiaki Umegaki Sony Pictures, 2004 average customer review:based on 56 reviews view larger image
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highly recommended

Redemption Where You Can Find It

Tokyo Godfathers is certainly not your run of the mill Anime. The plotline however is straightforward - Tokyo Godfathers is touching story of three homeless people: Gin (a down on his luck wino), Hana (a past his/her prime homosexual drag queen) and Miyuki (a runaway adolescent) - who come across a cast off baby and seek out the child's parents from clues they uncover. In the process of finding the parents, they inevitably turn around full circle and find themselves... and we in turn, ourselves. Appropriate for any Christmastime - it is set in a snow-covered metropolitan Tokyo. The movie is full of coincidence and has a feel of modern-day inner-city fairy tale. The movie is described as a comedy but the serious underpinning of urban angst pervades the scene. Subsequent to finding the toddler in the midst of a heap of rubbish, our three anti-heroes go about their business - while battling their demons - in a classical gumshoe fashion. Despite the many diversions into sub-stories such as gangland rescues and such, it is clear from the outset that the key to understanding the characters is the road home. As can be predicted with most fairy tales - even urban ones - there is a miracle or two. Moreover, as with redemption type stories there will be the inevitable reconciliation of parent to child - and Tokyo Godfathers is no exception. Part of Tokyo Godfather's charm is its ability to make social commentary amidst the comedy of errors - themes such as economic disparity and Foucauldian alienation or othering is all over the movie. Nevertheless, the key to investing in the movie is the complexity that Anime brings with it - a sense of transformation. That the characters where one way when we began and are very different now - just as we were one way when the movie began and effect a metamorphosis in the end. We share the experience of Gin, Hana, and Miyuki because it is cathartic and we can explore this in this imagined space... others are not so fortunate.

Miguel Llora

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Surpsisingly good - more than 5 stars

1. The directing was absolutely fantastic. Never thought that a japanese director would direct in such a marvelously way without showing any meaningless killings and tons of blood like most of the anime do (or meaningless, slow paced various scenes that most of the japanese-chinese movies have). The directing was too much for an anime and together with the state of the art technology the final result of both directing and anime was great.

2. Really funny, and humorus made me laugh more than a few times and again I laugh very hard with the "eastern asian" humor. This was clever and right to the point.

3. Nice dialogues that meant something and told the story correctly.

Overall this anime exceeded by far my expectations and I am looking forward to seeing more movies coming from this director. The last but a bit embarassing thing is that I hate the good christmass movies. I do so because they make me shed some tears (e.g Scrooged with Bill Marey etc). Imagine how embarassing is to shed tears with an anime. I am not even a girl damn it!!!

Bravo!!

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A Real Kon Artist!

Japanese animation director Satoshi Kon has done it again - making a film for adult sensibilities without resorting to excessive violence, profanity or pornography. And like his previous films, Perfect Blue and Millennium Actress, Tokyo Godfathers is hard to place on a shelf. Is it anime? It doesn't subscribe to the formulas that Americans have ascribed to anime: no robots, spaceships or superheroes. Is it drama? Though the story has elements of drama, it's also remarkably comic and filled with moments of fantasy. Is it adventure? Well, yes, but how many mainstream adventure films feature a teenage runaway, a deadbeat father and a homeless transsexual as protagonists?

Tokyo Godfathers is a real joy - another hit for Kon, who continues to reward viewers and befuddle the folks who try to shelve films according to genre.

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you'll love it even if you're not into anime...

I happened across this DVD in the bargain bin of a major video rental place. For $5 I thought, what the heck. I don't watch much Anime BUT I love foreign films and am up to trying new things.

All I can say is WOW! What a funny, thrilling, touching story of love and the power love has to work miracles.

I know that sounds hokey, but I think you'll agree when you watch how the films story falls neatly into place, almost like guidence from a "divine" hand.

The trio of heros, three homeless folks who stumble across an abandoned baby, are priceless and entertaining. You'll definately be rooting for the three and hope for a "happy" ending for them as well as the baby.

This movie is rated PG 13 but as a mom I think that some older children, with parental guidence, will learn a lot from the films story lines. That life is precious and we sometimes don't respect our own lives enough to realize that we deserve better. Besides minor violent scenes, the "drag queen" character, and one breastfeeding scene it's definately nothing compared to the violence/sexuality in US films. But use you're own discretion with your kids.

This animation speaks for itself-a visual feast.

5 stars!

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Good funny anime

I catched this on Starz the other day, this was a funny anime.

A baby thats kidnapped gets dumped and is found by a homeless gay couple. One man names the baby Kiyoto after his daughter.

By a strange twist, he meetshis long lost daughter, though the homeless man left his family and from then were heard treated to one bizarre scene after another.

The couple realized the baby is still lost and try to find the real mother, a woman claming to be the mother takes the baby, but the gay couple realize she is a fake and hunt her down.

Dont want to give anymore info except this is one funny anime.

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