mitchell.jedediah - 2015-02-22 17:58:14

this movie is so sad every time i watch it it just breaks my heart the ending is too much for me but it's so nice in the same time cute love the story 
(⊙︿⊙✿)

fmitchell - 2014-07-29 09:48:19

Minute 37

Hotarubi no Mori e is a profoundly symbolic movie about love. On the surface, it is the story of a little girl called Hotaru who one summer day gets lost in the forest. There, she encounters a masked boy called Gin who helps her find her way out of the forest. From then on, the two became close friends and met each other every summer... And gradually fell in love with each other.

However, as stated above, the movie is extremely symbolic. In this review, I shall attempt to explain the symbolism of each event. Of course, the beauty of symbolic art is that it can be perceived in various ways by each person; hence, the following interpretation is MY personal point of view. Other viewers may or may not share these thoughts:

Destiny: Hotaru meets Gin by chance. She gets lost, he helps her out, they fall in love... Symbolism: People do not choose or plan to fall in love; it all happens by chance.

Magic: Gin is a spirit. He is not an ordinary boy. Symbolism: Love is magical; love is out of this world; love is extraordinary; love cannot be explained by science...

Inner Beauty: Gin is wearing a mask. Before Hotaru saw his real face, she had been curious and perhaps a little attracted. It was only after she saw his face that she started really falling in love with him. Symbolism: Gin's face symbolizes inner beauty because it was hidden underneath a mask. People might be attracted to outer beauty (Gin's mask), but they fall in love only if the inner beauty is charming (Gin's face).

Forbidden Love: Hotaru is not allowed to touch Gin. Symbolism: It is the old forbidden love theme. People crave what they cannot get. 

Time: Hotaru comes to meet Gin summer after summer... Symbolism: Falling in love for real is a process which takes some time. Feelings need to gradually grow.

First Love: Hotaru grows older while Gin barely grows... Later on, Hotaru even becomes taller than Gin. Symbolism: Our first love remains the same in our heart no matter how older we grow. It would always remain a fixed beautiful memory.

Unattainable: When a kid touches Gin and he is about to fade away, Hotaru tries to embrace him... She barely manages to do so when he fades away. Symbolism: True love is a perfect state and thus unattainable. (Another angle: platonic love is a more sublime form of love; one which is ruined by physical touch...)

Memories: Hotaru ends up holding nothing but Gin's garment on the floor when he disappears. Symbolism: One is always left holding on to memories when love disappears. 

Life Goes On: Hotaru is shown at the end walking with a smile... Symbolism: One should not despair after the loss of their beloved. Life does eventually go on.

Well, you may find other interpretations to this movie's symbolism, but the bottom line is: Hotarubi no Mori e is a 44-minute masterpiece.

damore.blanca - 2014-03-08 13:29:03

How long does it take to get you fully invested in a story? 45 minutes if it is done right. This movie has a very simple but interesting story. A slow pace, not boring just leisurely. Likeable characters. Beautiful animation. A word of warning however, you may get emotional.

hroob - 2014-02-01 22:57:00

It really is a beautiful and tragic story.

That's literally all you need to know!

eugenia.borer - 2014-01-03 16:50:21

"It is sad not to love, but it is much sadder not to be able to love."
-Miguel de Unamuno

Love is not boundless as others claim it to be. Sometimes, we are separated from our loved ones by a vast ocean known as "life". Communication is a must in order preserve the connection between people. Even a simple message or email to someone close to you can easy reassure both parties that their feelings stay strong.

This theme is what makes Hotarubi no Mori e succeed in its tale of mild romance blanketed by an atmosphere of sadness.

Hotarubi no Mori e tells the story of Hotaru, a little girl who meets Gin, a young boy in a fox mask, after suddenly getting lost in a forest known to house spirits. Intrigued, Hotaru tries to befriend Gin but the latter explains that physical contact would cause him to disappear. The two develop a bond as Hotaru keeps coming back to the same forest every summer, spending her days with her new found friend.

The show starts off a typical meeting between strangers but as time progress, the development between the two characters is clearly present from the time of youth to adolescence and while most of these developments happen off-screen, the show having frequent time skips, one can truly feel that the emotional bond between the two as they grow steadily over the years, like seeing a young child growing up, happily spend an entire day just chatting and laughing with a father who only comes home once a year. It kind of gives off this emotional feeling broken into little tidbits that are put under the spotlight during the summer moments in the show. As Hotaru grows up, she starts to think more and more of Gin, realizing and giving off this feeling of boundary between the two, covering the show in a subconscious veil of sadness behind its supposed "happy" tune.

Art-wise, the show has a simple art style that fits in with the "fantasy" mood and setting. It never really goes over the top, with the palette being more focused on easy-going, light colors that are pleasant to the viewing eyes. This is backed up by a peaceful sounding soundtrack with pianos being used to full effect to give that feeling of emotional happiness/sadness throughout. All these aspects blend together perfectly, keeping the show in a sort of simple atmospheric bliss.

A story about a bond between two people who can never be, Hotarubi no Mori e is as bittersweet as it is wholly honest.

vincenza.huels - 2013-09-03 05:55:44

Jeez...how is it even possible for such a short film to make me feel so many emotions?! If you're even CONSIDERING watching this movie, then, please, do yourself a favor and just watch it. Seriously, it is quite perfect. The animation and colors are very pleasant and soothing, the story is paced very well (I thought this would be a slow movie, but it actually moves along pretty quickly! I kind of wish it were dragged on a little more, hehe), the music fits the scene and mood precisely, and the characters...the characters are what did it for me. They made this story. Hotaru, the little girl, isn't annoying at all, and is pretty funny, actually (this film really had me laughing at times). She's sweet, likable, and her voice is tolerable. Gin was awesome. For such a mysterious character who wasn't given much development (or whatever you call it), he was the best. The director did an amazing job in giving him so much emotion and personality despite having a freakin' mask over his face for most of the movie. The relationship between him and Hotaru was just...well, let me just say I was muffling my squeals, wiping my nose/eyes, rubbing my hurting cheeks (from smiling so much), and thinking about how I wish my life was as relaxing and joyful as theirs.

Please, at least give it a chance. It's only 44 minutes (40 if you don't include credits!). And you will enjoy spending those minutes on this great film! 5/5 FOR SURE.

graham.kaleigh - 2013-08-12 22:40:08

Even if youre not so intrested on anime or sth, you MUST watch HOTARUBI NO MORI E.

It is like one of those movies you never forget.The fist time I watched it I promissed myself not to cry, but I just can´t stop it.the way the movie shows the strange relationship between the characters,but without loosing the traditional japanese festivals, clothes, beliefs and stuff, it´s just amazing.It has remembered me when I used to wach ghibli´s movies,all day long.

I know it sounds like one of those predictions from some fortune cookie´s inside paper,but,belive me when I say this anime shows what truly love is.It is not only appearence and fisical contact,is the way youre related with someone;he/she makes you laugh,he/she helps you with sth you need,whatever,but you know the other person feels the same .

ejones - 2013-07-08 06:23:17

To be fair, I can summarize the whole plot in 3 sentences. with that being said, lets move on to the review:Though it leaves many questions unanswered, it is clear that the movie intended to have an emotional appeal. They did an excellent job at capturing such short story in a touching way. But I strongly disagree with the overwhelming scores of 10s on this movie. The problem with a simple story is that it eliminates the chances of revealing the characters' personality. For a movie that was supposedly focusing on the development of a relationship, it fails to go in dept with the characters. They left the characters in the simplest form that the reaction of the characters were easy to predict.I'm not implying that it is impossible to create a masterpiece with a simple story, but rather stating that there is a large tendency of its not being that way.There's not much to be said about this movie. Let's just say that it is designed merely to be touching. Nothing more.

kub.lukas - 2013-07-07 09:22:03

Hotarubi no Mori e is what i refer to as a gentle slice of life. Now i bet your wondering how a gentle slice of life differs from a regular slice of life, while a regular slice of life may put your heart in your mouth or make you a little teary eyed or even make you laugh. A gentle slice of life will give you non of these but you find you can not look away while watching it and once it has finished you recall back and think, 'wow that was pretty amazing'. Well i do anyway. For comparison sake, i consider Eve no Jikan and the Aria series gentle slice of life's.. and is it me or have i said slice of life way to often in this paragraph? It also has a supernatural element to it but frankly my dear even if you removed this element from the story and replaced it with something less supernatural it wouldn't detract from the enjoyment.One thing i really like about this series is that the story follows a large span of life. Granted with the 40 minute limit you only get small glimpses at the life of the two main characters. Gin and Hotaru. It starts with Hotaru being about 6 years old, i can't say for sure because i admit it, i was staring at the scenery far to often. She meets a boy of whatever age, nobody cares for his age, he doesn't age anyhow, but if i had to guess it would probably be around 16-18. Aaanyway, Gin is a spirit, sort of, i won't spoil it but watch it and it will explain what he is. Hotaru and Gin form a friendship and meet during the summer every year and while Hotaru grows up Gin doesn't, she briefy angsts over this but is quickly forgotton (was that a spoiler? maybe, but i don't believe it to be important). That reminds me, i forgot to point out the key point, Hotaru and Gin can never touch (that definitely ISN'T a spoiler) and this is actually where you can see Hotaru grow as a person as at the begining she tries to jokingly touch him. Basically throughout the years they have lots of fun together doing various activities, well not entirly various, they are stuck to being in a forest after all, but as various as one can get under the circumstances.Now i shall discuss in depth about the art and animation. I joke it won't be in depth at all. The art i found was very predictable. Yes predictable. This is from the original creator that made the manga for Natsume Yuujinchou and you can definitely tell, and that is why it's predictable. That is not a bad thing though. I found the art style perfectly suitable and really has a certain ambiance that is fitting to the show. The foliage are very paintingesque, a word from which i will continue to use in the future. Even when there are a lot of characters on the screen at the same time and non of which are important, but they are all different and arn't just a repeated face and this gives a feeling that each person might have there own story.Sakura Ayane voiced Hotaru and is the only voice actress listed for her character, she did a bloody good job as well. Considering throught the course of the story Hotary grows several years it's really nice to see she actually aged her voice slightly while all the while keeping the playfulness in it. Uchiyama Kouki did a good job as Gin by the way, i just felt it never stood out as being amazing or anything. In fact all the voice actors did splendid jobs and no one sounded stupid. Sometimes a characters can sound stupid, i don't like it when that happens so the lack of silly voices was a blessing.As for the music it was mostly a relaxing and calm sort of piano music and this created a fantastic atmosphere in the forest and really gave a slow feel about the show. This continued into the credits as the song for that was a nice ballad, it wasn't 'fuck me that was amazing, i need that in my playlist' nice but nice as in i didn't skip past it.I won't delve to deep into the characters as i probably risk repeating myself as to avoid spoilers. Hotaru starts out as a really enegetic and seemingly playful lone child and this continues throughout, she does mature however and this becomes one of my favorite things about the show. Gin who whilst doesn't mature as much as Hotaru (if at all) remains rather calm and relaxed. I don't have anytrhing else to say about the characters. there really wasn't that much to them, but at the same had a lot. So. here comes my summation in which i round all my thoughts about the show and either recommend you watch it or recommend you avoid it. With this one, i recommend you watch it. It's 40 minutes long so even if it does turn out to be against your taste it's not like you've wasted an hour or anything... With it being 40 minutes it is fast paced and as i had said previously does pass a number of years but while the time does fly the show remains calm, relaxing and genrally enjoyable all the time. There was never a moment in which i wanted it to get on with things. I wanted to take every bit of it in as i watched.

providenci.christiansen - 2013-05-22 09:19:55

From the same mangaka that wrote Natsume Yuujinchou, being adapted by the same animation studio that brought you Natsume Yuujinchou, directed by the same man who directed Natsume Yuujinchou. Would you believe then, that this is nothing like Natsume Yuujinchou? That it is, in fact, a rip-roaring action-packed adventure flick as the main characters ride wave after wave of explosions and cynical social satire? Of course you wouldn't believe it because you're not gullible. This is just Natsume Yuujinchou the Rather Short Movie.The story is very simple, almost refreshingly so compared to the convoluted mess that sometimes invades blockbuster flicks. A little girl gets lost in a forest and befriends a yokai in there who helps her find her way out. From there they establish a friendship and she goes to visit him every summer. The main crux of the story is that this yokai is lonely and has learned to dislike humans, but this girl has eased his loneliness and taught him how to feel love. You know, the exact same story that every single episode of Natsume is based around?It might sound like I don't like this movie, but that isn't the case. Like Natsume, the story is very capably told. It has a knack of hitting you with the emotional core of the story at the right parts, and does just enough characterisation of the lead two to make you care about them. It's a very short movie, only 45 minutes, so they wisely kept to only two characters. It's also got this neat way of not showing the characters faces at certain times so you've got to figure out for yourself what they're thinking. The yokai wears a mask throughout the film, but lifts it up every now and then and even puts it on the girl at one point, right at the moment when she (without spoiling) should have had a very...expressive face. It's a clever little move.I think my biggest problem with it is I don't see why it had to be a full movie. The animation looks the exact same as Natsume. Same light toned colours on all the characters. Same watercolour backgrounds. Same bloody sound effects even. Not that it's a bad look, but it wasn't even particularly well animated. I'm used to the idea that studios splash out when they go to the big screen. I also didn't feel like it needed to be 45 minutes. Most of the film was spent on the kid and the yokai playing in the forest. Sure, it as fun to watch the kid being a kid, because there's something inherently infectious about children's joy in simply playing. And sure, it was cool to watch the kid grow up slowly over the course of the film from a small girl to a teenager. But you could have easily cut out half that film and it would have still hit the right emotional notes at the right times.You know what? Take an episode of Natsume Yuujinchou. Have Natsume ask Nyanko has any stories of other yokais to tell him. Stick in a 20 minute version of this movie and have Nyanko occasionally narrate to imply he's the one telling the story, and it would fit perfectly. Same animation style, same music, same world setting, same essential moral to the story. Nobody watching would be able to tell the difference.