I always wanted to write a review on anime. But having no experience writing reviews or things like that, kinda makes me uncomfortable. Well, the film I want to talk about is titled "Summer Wars". It was one of the most anticipated films in 2009 but I have watched it just several days ago. The reason is that, I like to watch most of the things in English language and the English Dub was released on 15th February, 2011. Let's see some data about the film:

Name: Summer Wars (サマーウォーズ, Samā Wōzu)
Director: Mamoru Hosoda
Story: Mamoru Hosoda
Music: Akihiko Matsumoto
Key Studio: Madhouse

Director Mamoru Hosoda has become
one of my favorite director since The girl Who Leapt Through Time (2006). The Girl Who Leapt through Time was a work of art; no one can disagree with that. That's why I was impatiently waiting to watch Summer Wars, I visited Funimation (distributor of English version)'s website almost every week. And all the reviews about it were positive. So my expectations grew high enough that I thought it might surpass The Girl Who Leapt Through Time. But was it good enough? Let's see.


PLOT

First Look at OZ

The main plot of this movie is quite simple and age-old. A network like Facebook and Second Life with cloud computing named OZ which is used by almost every person around the globe to conduct communication, gaming, marketing, keeping eye on patients; in a word everything that is possible. And it is known to have the toughest encryption code mankind has ever known. Suddenly it is attacked by an A.I named Love Machine. Well it first sends that encryption code to every moderators of OZ and some of them cracks it right. And then Love Machine starts to take over OZ and the world goes frenzy.

Well, that is the main part of the story. But another part is related to the Jinnouchi family. Jinnouchi family goes back sixteen generatons and was a proud clan in the Japanese but the current condition is not that good now a days. Even so, the family's head ninty years Grandma Sakae Jinnouchi recieves a lot of greeting cards from political leaders, large stores and so on... The Jinnouchi family is quite big.

Let's have a look on some characters and more on the plot....

From left to right: Sakae Jinnouchi, Natsuki Shinohara, Kenji Koiso

Natsuki Shinohara asks Kenji Koiso to act as her fiancée for a limited time during the 90th birthday celebration of her great grandmother Sakae Jinnouchi. Kenji is a Mathstar and runner up in National Math Olympiads and a part time moderator of OZ and also has a crush on Natsuki. Through circumstances he is compelled to act as her fiancée and to the countryside. One night he recieves a code (Yes! The encryption code) and cracks it. Next day he finds out that he is the prime suspect for hacking OZ.

In the mean time Great Grandfather's illegitimate son Wabisuke who is a Computer Scientist and Professor returns to Japan from US. He was adopted by Sakae. Turns out that he is the developper of Love Machine and now intends to sell it to US military and they are testing the A.I on OZ.

Kazuma also from the Jinnouchi family is the champion of OZ Martial Arts tournament and the first one goes in a confrontation with Love Machine in a Martial Arts tournament (he didn't know it was a hacking A.I) and looses.

After some scenes we see that, because of all communication being destroyed the doctor couldn't keep track of grandma's vital signs and she dies just before her 90th birthday. Which makes Wabisuke regret and the whole Jinnouchi family along with Kenji comes forward to stop Love Machine so that nothing ill happens to other families.

I will keep the plot to that... Otherwise it will turn out to be a pile of Spoilers.

Now, the good part of the plot is, it is well organised. And the plot consists of sci-fi, romance and a lot of comedy. And it is sure that people will get sucked into story.
And the bad part is, the story is not that Unique. And like other anime of same type it decided to visualize the bot, net bot etc.; change A.I's appearance as it keeps taking over other profiles (and in the anime it was shown such that the A.I was eating different avatars; kinda funny and makes me feel that it was a joke).

Two little Devils

With this movie I first heard about the card game named Hanafuda. I didn't understand any of it; may be the movie would have been much fun to watch if I have known how this game is played. In addition, the whole movie has a feel of comedy in it. Well, the most funny are the three little kids named Yuhei, Shingo and Mao. All their twittering, mischievous deeds were really fun to watch. And Shota Jinnouchi's comical expressions added more fun.



DIRECTION

Mamoru Hosoda is an excellent director, no doubt about that. And I will say, he has done a great job in this anime. Probably ten years later he will be one of the best anime directors of that time. And my previous favourite director Satosi Kon being dead there is no competitor for him. On the other hand Mamoru Oshii who is also an excellent director but his anime are intended for adult viewers. So apart from Miyazaki and some other Ghibli films he is the only one who is reaching to a larger audience. Silly me! I was supposed to talk about Summer Wars not Mamoru's career....

Well, Summer Wars was directed really well. The director even took time to make the world around the characters varsatile which is rarely seen in anime.


ANIAMTION

The animation was sweet. And really enjoyable. From the studio Madhouse that has done Perfect Blue, Paprika, The Girl Who Leapt Through Time, Death Note and many more worldwide renowned anime. So I think animation will not make you feel uncomfortable when you are watching this anime unless you are allergic to japanese Anime or 2D animation.

MUSIC

The score of this film is awesome. And most probably people will get sucked into this anime because of the score.

And to prove all of that I provide you with a video clip:


And for overall rating I would like to give 3.5/5 stars.






Courtesy to Wikipedia.org as I could write characters name with correct spelling with the help of it. :)


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