Audience reviews
8 · Sample from the first available page, separate from the total number of ratings.
Cato12742147
I didn't really get it, but I liked the artwork, is 4 minutes long, and you can watch it in Youtube.
This crearly isn't an 'anime', it's just an animated short film, there isn't much to say, if you want to watch a short film, you can watch this, maybe you like it, maybe you don't, but it's just 4 minutes long, I didn't undestand the story, maybe I will watch again if I want to show it to someone that I think may like it.
Sound 9/10: They just say "ai", but in differents tones, I really liked that, I think that is what I liked the most about this short.
Art 8/10: I like it the art, seems original and simple.
Read at the sourceGsarthotegga
It's really interesting going through the "avant garde" section of an anime website. There was a lot of very obscure stuff I hadn't heard of, but there are diamonds in the rough like Studio 4c shorts, a few animation compilations, Atsushi Wada, Koji Yamamura, Keita Kurosaka... surprisingly even Takashi Ito, whom I never thought of as animation--his stuff is live action with a bit of stop motion and time lapses (but this is not the puppet or claymation type of stop motion; rather it's used for experimental effect). There are always the debates about what constitutes anime, with the assumption that something like Kuri's work isn't anime because of a lack of commercial viability or the industry norms we expect from "anime," but this is just the general word for animation from a Japanese persp…
Read at the sourcelethargilistic
Unnerving. Creepy sounds and a lot of odd imagery depicting romantic pursuit as almost this alien, aggressive thing that we do forever just because it's called "love."
Most reviews of this movie are absolutely insufferable because they're from anime fans, coming from a tradition of animation that has nothing to do with this, or avant guard fans, who might mean well but come off as shitty when they say only people who've studied art can properly judge this. It's a piece that's supposed to evoke an emotional reaction in you, and you're supposed to think about that reaction. If you think you need a degree to do that, you're an elitist fool. Likewise, if you think this is bad just because it doesn't use an anime aesthetic, you're a narrow-minded fool.
The short is 4 minutes long. Just give i…
Read at the sourceLethesu
I'm an art student and as you know, 'art' definition can change in years. Okay, I agree on this isn't a masterpiece but please bear in mind that It was made in 1963. "Ai" is an experimental Japanese animation, a short story about love. Today we watch it and say "Typical story, basic drawing, zero quality" but those days art technology didn't have that many opportunities and story concept not even close to today's percept. So maybe this was a very original story. (And heroine is the very first yandere ever :P)
In addition to all these, I liked "Ai". It's trippy and psychedelic in a way, It was an interesting experience to watch it.
Read at the sourceParaturtle
Story:
I'll be the first to admit that I'm not a fan of narratives that are negative. By that, I mean stories where the hero loses in the end and the whole them is essentially, "Life sucks because X." Ai doesn't say something exactly quite like that, but it is a bastardized perspective on love. Perhaps I'm looking 'too deep' into this work but when you realize that Yoko Ono also contributed to this work, you haveta sit back sarcastically and go, "Oh man now we're getting to intense levels of intellect left untapped in the human mind for years!"
Goodness, I didn't even hate this work and more or less found it to be just another work to add to my Completed list but in retrospect, there's just so much to dislike about it. I mean, alright, I'm not gonna go nuts with details but the premise is…
Read at the sourceSidewinder51
Rate 3
Japanese raw but it was just one word repeated over and over.
Story
Could have used a better introduction. Seemed to have just right to the story. Story was a bit confusing. If it was about love why the running away and the leash? Conclusion was nice but could have been better.
Art
Worked well with plot. Characters poorly drawn. At least there was some color and the characters weren't morphed.
Sound
An okay hearing test (joke). You got your high and low pitches or voices. Which not only were uncalled for but did not match the art. Why did it just have to be one word? Animations were good.
Overall: nothing gained. Audio annoying. Art meh. Story lame. If you like art pieces check this. If not don't bother.
Read at the sourceScherezade
Many people who go to watch this experimental film are probably expecting an anime. However... This is not an anime... It's a work of abstract art and is in of itself something that you can not get if you don't study art or do not have an avant-garde artistic sense. If you don't understand either of them, don't rate it. It's like trying to get a pop lover to rate the works of Stockhausen. They are two completely different things.
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Story: 8
It's obvious that this is very well crafted. People confuse abstract with complicated ideas, but this is a very straight forward portrayal of love and the development of that emotion over time.
The fact that someone can grasp that idea or even convey it without dialogue(plus this being 1962) is quite a big feat. Still... no emotional attac…
Read at the sourceBrookeAnn
Just really, really creepy. If having your mind crawled on by spiders is what you're into, go for it. But with terrible art, terrible voice acting, two plain and stereotypical characters, and a terrible story (was there even a story?), the four-minute-long anime (can it be called an anime?) was almost unwatchable. I counted the seconds.
The best part about this anime? It was only four minutes long. Seriously, I hated it.
Read at the source