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Apr 19, 2017akirakato rated this title 4 out of 5 stars
This is a 1991 Japanese animated drama (おもひでぽろぽろ, which literally means "Memories Come Tumbling Down") written and directed by Isao Takahata, based on the manga of the same title by Hotaru Okamoto and Yuko Tone. The film explores a genre traditionally thought to be outside the realm of animation, attracting a large adult audience---particularly women. Taeko, a 27-year-old unmarried woman, has lived her whole life in Tokyo and now works at a company there. She decides to take a trip to visit the family of the elder brother of her brother-in-law in the rural countryside to help with the safflower harvest and get away from city life. While traveling at night on a sleeper train to Yamagata, she begins to recall memories of herself as a schoolgirl in 1966, and her intense desire to go on holiday like her classmates, all of whom have family outside of the big city. She hasn't had her own "rural hometown." During her stay in Yamagata, she finds herself increasingly nostalgic and wistful for her childhood self, while simultaneously wrestling with adult issues of career and love. She recalls the first stirrings of childish romance, puberty and growing up, the frustrations of math and boys. In lyrical switches between the present and the past, Taeko wonders if she has been true to the dreams of her childhood self. Eventually, Taeko faces her own true self. The film seems to stir everybody's nostalgia.