Audience reviews
20 · Sample from the first available page, separate from the total number of ratings.
1stDecame4Danime
This movie has a shallow plot about a SoL coming-of-age child's story which thrusts all the worst possible things together. It also presents shallow and cringey kiddy romance to pointlessly parallel the shallow excuse of romance that the mc falls into as an adult. Of course neither plot actually goes anywhere. The lack of plot makes it hard to find any of it interesting, and even the art/music is unremarkable.
In actuality, the movie is an excuse for preaching of city bad, farming good. Follow traditionalism, be good worker, get married, be a stay at home mother like everyone tells you to, etc.
This is among the worst Studio Ghibli movies in my opinion.
1/10 (where 5/10 is average)
Read at the sourcebergars
Man, that's the kind of movie I needed from Ghibli.
There's this melancholy about the film, about growing older, with the most founding memories being from your youngest days. A woman reminisces about her life as a bratty kid that didn't know of her fortune, and misfortunes; of her dismissive parents, her educational, and emotional disconnect from people. It feels larger than life, while being just about one person with a common childhood. Life's problems aren't always because of past problems, but the lack of anything else after them. Nothing stood out, nothing has stood out afterward, but then, what's there in the future?
This is a movie that truly explores the harshness of being an adult in cahoots with moving forwards. A small rite of passage, a little holiday to remind her of what s…
Read at the sourcektulu007
Omoide Poroporo is a Studio Ghibli film from the early 90s. It's based off of a manga by Okamoto Hotaru. I've reviewed a lot of Ghibli films in the past and they do tend to be pretty good.
Story:
Our narrative follows Okajima Taeko, a young woman in her late twenties. She decides to go help at a farm in the countryside for her vacation since her sister married a man connected to it. All the while, she can't help but reminisce about what her life was like in the 5th grade.
Let's start with the big, fundamental flaw with this film. It's exceptionally boring. The characters are basically the dullest, most insipid group you'll ever meet and the events are dull moments from Taeko's unexceptional in any capacity life. Her past and present. Even with the romance, it's between a pair of chara…
Read at the sourceAhiru229
I love realistic movies, those that simply show the experiences of our characters. Even so, if it lacks a good development in its themes then the result cannot aspire to be more than mediocre.
This movie shows how even with the direction of the great Takahata and the production values of Ghibli, when a story has no ambitions and tries to show something so simple there is no way to improve it.
Story (5/10):
To be honest, there is not much to talk about this movie. The film tries to give a certain feeling of nostalgia to the viewer, but fails in that, the protagonist reflects on important moments and how they provoked the she who is now at the same time that she realizes other changes in her.
Even so, this also makes the film very boring and is that with almost 2 hours of duration the film…
Read at the sourceNoitora33
The movie wasn't even sad but I felt like crying anyway...
I won't say I have seen a great deal of anime, but this one was by far the most relatable to life.
Okajima Takea is a 27 year old office lady who visits the countryside on her vacation. On the way to her journey and during her say in the country, she seemed to recall her 10 year old self again and again. And I can relate to them all. The struggle of having elder siblings, not doing well in the exam, first love confession, first period talk and boys reaction to it and even mothers have their flaws. I can relate to them all. I was watching the anime and the whole time I was like... it's the story of my life. And I hope the decision she made at the end will make her happy and leave her with no regrets. Studio Ghibli has so many g…
Read at the sourceOptigisa
Omoide Poroporo, otherwise known as Only Yesterday, is one of the most underrated movies to have ever come out of Studio Ghibli’s discography. It is easily the best made movie in Ghibli’s history when it comes to the visual presentation, and Takahata here showcased how he was a master of both color and visuals. Omoide Poroporo was a movie that was made to be targeted towards women upon it’s release, but due to Isao Takahata’s brilliant directing, the movie managed to become a success around men and women alike.
The story surrounds Taiko, a twenty seven year old woman who leaves the city and her work for ten days to go on a vacation in the rural areas and relax her mind. What really sets this movie apart from the rest of the others is the fact that on the way to her destination, her littl…
Read at the sourceAnimeBW
It’s a difficult situation to be in when you come across a piece of media that just doesn’t speak that closely to you, despite how much effort was clearly put into it. Only Yesterday is a film of genuine merit and skill, far from a hack production or compromised product. It’s a warmly realized portrait of temporal dissonance, of looking back on the person you used to be and wondering how that person grew up to be the person you are now, what changed, what stayed the same, what you left behind and took with you, and what you wish you could go back and do over again. And it carries itself with genuine grace, courtesy of the always excellent directorial hand of Isao Takahata, who’s proven himself adept at capturing the reality of the human experience through animation time and time again. But…
Read at the sourcesimplereviewer
Script - Some chick is going to the field to spend some time away from the noisy city and there she reminds of her youth, and well, that's it. It's adapted from an episodic manga and the idea was to gather certain moments of the protagonist's past as a cohesive feeling of nostalgia. Taking a look at the interactions you'll notice they are rather realistic, with uncomfortable silences and stares at every corner. Now, maybe is just me but I grew up in a family where I was the youngest brother and man, that sucks. My two brothers were very close and I felt very isolated, just like the protagonist. It's a sort of loneliness that's so subtle and quite unnoticed, but as sad as any other, even more if you don't actually have any friends. Now, with that kind of background, I felt intrigued by how…
Read at the sourceObjectivity_jk
Only Yesterday is a very uncomfortable sit, and I'm not just talking about the twenty minutes dedicated to young girl's periods. The film's world is fairly well animated, but it looks and feels very empty, giving the story a depressing mood as if someone died. I want to mostly talk about the plot generally so I'll get everything else out of the way quickly.
Art: Looks pretty good, but the simple style can sometime exasperate the feeling of emptiness
Sounds: I like the soundtrack, but a few moments during the film the music is unnecessarily kitschy.
Character: Most characters are ether mean spirited, self-centred, kooky, or boring. I can't even imagine how most of these characters were supposed to be endearing since they were defined by negative traits (besides the dad because he has the…
Read at the sourceRising_Sun
An almost unknown film of Ghibli that although does not count on the magic of the other films shows us another great history of quality that is something difficult to understand for certain people.
The story of Taeko is a pure and literal slice of life that may be tedious to see in certain parts for those who do not like this genre.
The quality of animation was not much to my liking and the Soundtrack is quite difficult to perceive.
I really liked the part where "the past" meets "the present" giving an end to the story to the height of other Ghibli films.
If you like (rather) the slice of life stories you must see this work of Isao Takahata full of nostalgia that will surely remind you of some parts of your childhood.
Read at the sourcemodernjosei
Only Yesterday understands the nuances of childhood nostalgia. I think to a certain degree we all want to relive the simplicity and easygoing nature of our childhood, but unfortunately reality has other plans. Depending on where we are in life, our childhood memories can play a huge part in understanding where we came from, and why we are the way we are today. Only Yesterday takes this idea and creates a movie out of it, and it’s something that’s incredibly relatable, no matter your age.
Only Yesterday is visually breathtaking. As you would expect from Studio Ghibli, this movie is beautiful from start to finish. The backdrops for each scene are incredibly detailed, and all the countryside scenes were an absolute marvel to watch. Those scenes perfectly captured the still beauty of Japan’s…
Read at the sourceAnnoKano
There are plenty of films that can impress you the first time you watch them, but there are only a few that impress you more and more with every subsequent viewing. Only Yesterday is just such a movie, one so rich in depth that the first viewing is only as good as a passing glance at the painting of an old master.
Taeko Okajima is a twenty seven year old office worker in Tokyo. Summer holidays are fast approaching and Taeko is doing what she normally does, and will travel to work on a farm in the countryside. During the course of her journey she experiences an overwhelming sense of nostalgia and memories of her childhood. It is an effective plot device that allows us to witness two characters developing simultaneously and the influence one has in the formation of the other. Neither are ex…
Read at the sourceFabio
If you want in any way, to see a family eating a pineapple and simply have an intense emotional reaction, almost cry by quietly staring at the characters just moving, if you are tired of the laziness among animators these days in general then I cannot recommend anything other than the remarkable underrated masterpiece:
Only Yesterday.
The reason why Only Yesterday might be the most realistic anime movie of all time is that, they did, care about the smallest things, the characters' movements, their eyes, their mouths, how the whole cast reacts to an action, how they gave everyone enough space to experience their opinions without being repetitive, how they completed the puzzle and at the same time they focused on our protagonist herself, this is important simply because it prevents predict…
Read at the sourceMixxu
When your inner self starts remembering past memories and those enjoyable times and can't just forget those lovely memories. Only Yesterday or japanese titled "Omohide poro poro" is touching movie for Isao Takahata. I watched this movie yesterday and I really loved it.
Story: - 10
Story is pretty simple and it's nice to follow because your hearing the story by narrator who is telling it for. Now why these story just drives in it's because you can easily relate to characters I am sure many of us has some or less school memories and other memories. Story is not boring at all it's starts with slow pacing but picks up pacing pretty fast. Why I like this story so much is that it's gives 2 viewpoints adult's and child. It's also describing very well daily japanese high school life and shows w…
Read at the sourcedavieboy232
there are a lot of things that can be said about this but im just going to point out some that stick out the most.
the movie itself is one of a woman who questions herself about her life more or less in a nutshell. the intro and some other music in this movie was calming and made portions of the movie seem serene which was a nice touch. the art work would have achieved a better score if it weren't for one thing and this is just my opinon, but did any one else notice how bizzar looking Okajima looked everytime she smiled? she did not look 27 at all when she did, but more older.
the story line did not appeal to me as i hoped it would and was bothered by the fact that her life in just the 5th grade was just downright awful and made me wonder and would bring that up a lot and the result of…
Read at the sourceChidoriCipCirip
I'm not good at writing reviews but i just want to say what i liked about this anime: remembering yourself as a child and the important memories at that age and how they make a person develop.
And i was surprised to hear hungarian and rumanian national music on the soundtrack. ^^
Read at the sourceValwin
We can notice that there is a tendency to overrate average productions when it comes to their true value. It is probably caused by TV and the fact that the best selling anime are being watched by kids raised on sex and violence occuring in the Internet. Anime based on those two things (sex & violence) shows that it is much easier to make such anime insted of trying to show people something important and valuable. Only Yesterday is one of those "depper" and underrated productions, which can appear on endangered species list soon if that tendecy mentioned before won't be stopped.
First, I have say that I simply love that kind of storyline. Not only that. The tempo of action is great (in my opinion). Main character (Taeko, if I'm not mistaken) starts her travel (which is actually a travel to…
Read at the sourceMaeBern
This movie is not half bad. When I watched I thought it was boring at first and was going to drop it but as the movie went on it turn out to be okay. I have to say this movie is hard to understand and if you do not look at the details than it might be hard. After the movie, I started looking back to my past and found some little things that I still have. This is a cute little movie gets you thinking about the things you had or still have. I have to say though this movie should be watched by an adult or late teens. Children can watch but I do not believe they would truly understand. That is my opinion of course. Overall I have to say this movie was good.
Read at the sourceShugocharalover
It's been a while since I've watched this, so bear with me...
-Spoiler free-
Story-
The story switches back and forth between the now grown up main character- Taeko Okajima – and her childhood self. Although many seem to dub the story unoriginal I beg to differ, the setting and style is unlike anything I’ve ever seen. Yes I must agree that the underlying aspect of the story; did my life really turn out the way I want it to? - is rather weak. However I like to think that things like whether it’s weak or not can be changed dramatically by directing and art, which this story succeeds in, therefore supplying the whole story with quite a strong and actually rather beautiful tone to it. I think the story is emotional and quite enjoyable however some may find fault with its m…
Read at the sourceYourMessageHere
Now and again, I find I'm being asked why I like anime, and what's so special about it. One answer you hear given quite often to questions like this is "it's not just for kids, anime is for grownups too". I used to say this too, but in the case of much of what's out there, after much thought I realised that's not really accurate. Sure, there's anime out there that's full of sex and/or death and/or 'mature themes', and a lot of things that are more complex than children are thought to be able to deal with, but not much anime, if we're being honest, deals with proper complex issues. Or at least, not in any more complex a way than your average US live action TV series like 24 or Star Trek; anime might not all be for kids, but precious little isn't primarily aimed at teenagers (which is an obs…
Read at the source