K-On The Movie

[pfarber]

I've heard K-On mentioned quite a few times as one of the 'significant' anime from the modern (2005-ish) era.

I tried to watch an episode but Dear God it was annoying... the voices are just way to 'cute'. Like a 6 year old trapped in 18 year old bodies. So I never got past half way though the first episode. But when I saw there was a K-On movie I figured they would have refined the characters and story enough to, well, warrant the cost of a movie.

NOPE.

K-On the Movie is just as slow, sappy, and predictable as ever. The humor was on a 6-year old's level and the dialog was not much more advanced than that. Evidently K-On is a band, and when they performed they sang in Japanese.... so there's about 20 minutes of a 120min movie where you have absolutely no idea what's being said. And the kicker is THE ENTIRE MOVIE IS ABOUT THE SONG AT THE END. So yeah... 120 minutes to build up (well, not really, they only mention this super critical plot arc like 6 times) and when they DO play the song you never get the emotional payoff of UNDERSTANDING what they are singing about. And at the end, Ass-Meow, or Ass-Mitten of whatever the fuck her name is really never shows much emotion.. she's like... meh.. a song. And claps. The end.

On the plus side the animation is above average, but they did use some crappy matte's and the movement of the characters seemed much to slow.. but that may have been to confuse the copyright bots (I watched the movie on youtube.. its common to speed up/slow down/reverse a movie). The detail of the band playing was average... at most the hand that strummed the strings was in time with the songs... and the fret hand was just 'close enough' ... but after watching 'God Knows' from Hurahi and GDM from Angel Beats I may have an unreasonably high standard.. but then again White Album 2 did a good job.

I will add that the night taxi ride scene is very well done.. the lighting was dead on... But evidently the studio never looked at a photo of an English person as the people of London were just anonymous blobs and the baby that was 'so cute' looked like it had Downs Syndrome. Way to go Japan.... next time look at a photo of a white person or two before you make a movie about another country. That said, the 3 of the 5 main characters were CHARACTERISTICALLY NOT Japanese. Two brunettes (one may have been a Ginger) and a blonde in a Japanese High School??? Way to be edgy while at the same time keeping the characters in mini skirts, in the dead of winter, while everyone else is in heavy coats. Oh Japan and its misogynistic ways.

All in all skip the movie... it is, at it's best, a predictable story, childish (as in 'jiggle the car keys to entertain a baby') humor, and unbearably sappy to the point of wanting to slit the throat of the next Moe character that says the phrase 'tea time'.