Audience reviews
20 · Sample from the first available page, separate from the total number of ratings.
supremeleadrcora
Approximately 80% of this movie boils down to "trans women are ugly" or "trans women are delusional men". This is particularly difficult to ignore for the first half of the movie where transphobic jokes are pretty much the only thing that gets screen time, but even after they decided to lay off a bit, I still couldn't get over the bad taste in my mouth.
The movie is not without redeeming qualities--the themes of parenthood, remorse, forgiveness, and complicated familial relationships are all well-portrayed throughout the film--but even if it wasn't for the aforementioned transphobic caricature being the designated comic relief throughout the film, it would still be mediocre by Satoshi Kon standards. I'm not saying that everything Satoshi Kon makes has to be psychological, but if this is…
Read at the sourceCiaran_Zagami
I really wanna rate this film higher but to put it simply it starts overplaying its hand.
Feels like it really should not have been as long as it is and at some point the script just starts running out of material. Which is weird cause there's at least two whole plot lines that just get completely dropped by the end. Meanwhile for smaller scenes too many set ups are reused which leads to an overall feeling of exhaustion that brings down the end of the film significantly.
If I was rating just the first half or so I'd say it's a 9/10. But with how much it drags on it looses a lot of its energy.
Still a good film that I'd give a solid recommendation to if you don't mind a little Christmas shlock.
Read at the sourceBa-Cii10
If someone is bored with Kevin for Christmas, I recommend Tokyo Godfathers.
During Christmas, three homeless people in Tokyo discover a baby in a garbage can. The friends decide to find the child's parents.
-Great animation full of details.
-Cool characters, the main trio has great dynamics.
-A lot of funny and touching moments.
I'm just warning you that there are a lot of unrealistic coincidences that push the action forward, the finale especially requires a lot of suspension of disbelief, this is supposedly explained by the fact that Kyoko brings happiness and simply the magic of Christmas xD It doesn't bother me because the atmosphere and characters do the job, but I know it may annoy some people.
8/10 imo
Read at the sourceEmpireDeLuna
While not reaching the same high in terms of narrative and concept as the other Kon's work, the grounded and realistic display of the environment and animation, would reach the deepest part of our heart more than any other.
Tokyo Godfather is undoubtedly the best attempt at unashamedly humor and irony for society a movie could ever be! It's unapologetically campy, straightforward, and often time feels cheap. But the cartoonists take at humanity of their heroes, never losses their souls in the midst of their harsh world.
It's easy to diminish the entire story, just because of the amount of conveniences, get hand-feeds everytime the plot's needed it. But it also easy to overlook the optimism that the three protagonists embodied. It's easy to forget the huge misfortunes in their lives, just…
Read at the sourcePolkaMocha
After falling in love with Satoshi Kon's Paprika and Perfect Blue, I recently watched Tokyo Godfathers with no idea what it was about or the general reception of it.
The story is sweet and heart warming. There are points where events happen a little too conveniently and plot twists feel a little too coincidental to suspend disbelief, which at times can make the film feel cheesy. Though it is meant to be a comedy, I would have liked to see the humor taper off towards the emotional climaxes for more impact.
Additionally, I felt the portrayal of the crossdressing character a little insensitive and stereotypical at times -- often being the butt of jokes a little too often for comfort. But, I will leave that out of my rating as I do not know enough about that lifestyle to make a fair comment.…
Read at the sourceCodeBlazeFate
Satoshi Kon is widely considered an auteur of bizarre masterpieces. Perfect Blue, Paprika, and Millennium Actress are all strange, high-concept films to varying degrees. However, Tokyo Godfathers might somehow be his oddest film. This isn't due to the film taking the concepts of blurring reality and fiction to insane new levels while incorporating even crazier ideas. The film barely even touches the idea, and it barely even mentions the concept of film in any way. These are two of the greatest hallmarks of a Satoshi Kon movie, and they're largely absent. Therefore, this film is the biggest risk the late director had taken as it seems to be out of his traditional wheelhouse...or is it?
Millennium Actress is my personal favorite of his, and while one of those reasons is due to the beautiful…
Read at the sourceJex
I watch Tokyo Godfathers every Christmas. It's a fantastic Christmas movie, but it's not just a Christmas movie. It's also a fantastic family movie and a fantastic auteur film. It's Satoshi Kon's greatest movie, out of the few films he was able to make in his lifetime.
The main characters are Gin, Hana and Miyuki. All of them are hobos and all have contrasting personalities. Gin is an alcoholic who doesn't want to face reality, so he makes up stories and lies a lot. He wants to shift the blame of his failures onto someone else instead of changing for the better. Hana is an okama, which is the Japanese version of a crossdresser, but is associated with homosexuality. Okamas are seen as weirdos in Japan and are not accepted by the mainstream. Miyuki is a bratty young girl who wants to be lef…
Read at the sourceIchikuRyodai
Satoshi Kon writes and directs this animated feature, may he rest in peace. Truly a legendary genius, a mind like few we were lucky enough was put into making films.
What a masterpiece, Jesus.
A genuine hymn to life, lead by three homeless underdogs with broken spirits, forgotten by the world and in such need of love, desperately climbing their way up to redemption and knockin' on heaven's door with this holy second-chance-awarding abandoned baby they stumble upon, whose life they embark on an urban adventure to save on a Christmas Eve night.
A cinematic odyssey with characters of such humanity their broken dreams, flaws, hopes and love disencounters feel absolutely 3D. So striking, so emotional. Driven through this perfect-ass script that develops smoothly, unpredictably and comfortably;…
Read at the sourceggultra2764
Tokyo Godfathers is a rather unique film from Satoshi Kon as it differs from his other works in that the movie is not as heavy on the cerebral side. Set in Tokyo during the holiday season, the movie focuses on a trio of homeless people from different walks of life who come across an abandoned baby and journey throughout the city to learn of the whereabouts of the baby's parents. While doing this, each of these people come to grips with their tragic pasts as the movie explores the varying circumstances that led each of our main trio to wind up living on the streets.
This movie is a rather unique one as it believably explores the issue of homelessness, a social issue that is not often explored within anime or many movies for that matter. Instead of trying to skirt around the issue with a po…
Read at the sourcemyronator
It's a Christmas miracle!
The stereotypical Christmas film involves plenty of coincidences, a corny, cheesy message and the extraordinary. Tokyo Godfathers has all of this in spades. The film even emphasises this at the beginning when Hana wishes for a Christmas miracle. However, unlike other Christmas films, this has Satoshi Kon's zany influence.
The premise for Tokyo Godfathers is a dark, yet interesting one; three homeless people finding an abandoned baby. In fact, most of the film deals with dark themes, such as the abuse of homeless people. But the film has an amazing ability to merge these dark themes with a lighthearted adventure. While convention would show these scenes involving tragedy to be incredibly depressing, there is somehow a positive twist to it. This leads to an enter…
Read at the sourceKeatle
Tokyo Godfathers is a work by Satoshi Kon, produced by Madhouse and was released in 2003. It is an original story set in the not-so-beautiful setting of Tokyo and deals with the themes of abandonment and family.
The whole story is completed in a matter of days, but so much happens in such a short time.
These characters that, at first, seem like caricatures slowly reveal their true selves to each other and grow closer. They evolve past the first impressions and leave a mark on the audience. This was, at least for me, the highlight of this 90 minutes long movie.
However, the story itself didn't impact me as much. It is heavily built around coincidences, actually, pretty much everything that happens is a coincidence. From the very first scene to the very last. At first, I didn't have a pro…
Read at the sourcezacoist
The holiday season is finally here, and with the holidays always come the festivities. Shopping, spending time with family, decorating the Christmas tree, cuddling with loved ones alongside the soft embers of the fireplace: these are all the ideals of a perfect Christmas. After all, there's nothing more to love about Christmas than the gifts or the food, right? Well, maybe if you're a middle-aged salaryman. To our three protagonists, they'd just be happy if they could find a leftover bottle of booze in Tokyo's garbage dumps.
Little did they know that they were setting themselves up for a wild goose chase to find not only the mother of an abandoned baby, but also to rediscover the homes they thought they had abandoned for good.
Tokyo Godfathers tackles the age-old message of the irreplac…
Read at the sourcektulu007
Tokyo Godfathers is a film directed by Kon Satoshi, who also directed the superb Perfect Blue, and co-written by Wolf's Rain creator, Nobumoto Keiko. With animation and production from Madhouse, whether it's the branch of Madhouse that ruins action scenes with random T & A shots or the branch that does stellar work remains to be seen. Yes, I have become convinced that Madhouse has one division to do animation for quality projects like Rainbow, Monster and the aforementioned Perfect Blue and another for their drek projects like Highschool of the Dead or Devil Hunter Yohko. Although in reality they probably have a lot more divisions than that. I am cautiously optimistic about this one since the director and co-writer have both done some spectacular work, but keep in mind that the last time I…
Read at the sourceLostPerson
Well...Hmmm.. Tokyo godfather. What can I say?
directed by the famous Satoshi Kon who created perfect blue and paranoia agent which is a psychological anime full of gore and mind fuck. presents a heartwarming anime movie with a Christmas theme.
It's great! :D and what I can say is, this is the first time that I saw an anime nailed what Christmas is all about.only 1% of the people of japan are Christians and when you ask them why do they celebrate Christmas most of them is gonna tell you that it's a holiday for lovers and you need to celebrate it with a bucket of chicken. and we can see that clearly if you already watched an anime called Amagami SS.
some anime including Hayate no Gotoku and the new Denki no Honya-san has some episodes that clearly tells us how the Japanese celebrates…
Read at the sourcekekekeKaj
"Tokyo Godfathers" is a Christmas film. Tradition dictates that these films should contain elements such as light hearted comedy and family oriented themes. And that exactly the kind of film "Tokyo Godfathers" strives to be.
Does it succeed? Most certainly. But the crux is that "Tokyo Godfathers" is the work of Satoshi Kon, a man famous for his dark, twisted mind fucks such as "Paranoia Agent" and "Perfect Blue". He's probably the person you would least expect to make a conventional Christmas film.
For the most part, "Tokyo Godfathers" doesn't feel like a Satoshi Kon film - it doesn't even have the mixing fantasy with reality trick that Kon was so fond of. The film is simply a heart warming tale about three homeless people searching for the parents of a baby who they found abandoned on…
Read at the sourcemjcabreza
What else can I say... This movie had a great storyline, a huge unexpected twist near the ending, held mystery from the very beginning, had very witty humor (I caught myself laughing out loud many times), characters were well introduced, it was rather heartwarming as well, family-focused, gives definition to what life truly is, pacing and story progression was really good, art was outstanding, I really have to say that I enjoyed this movie A LOT. Made me remember the Ghosts of Christmas Past, Present and Future but twisted it up a bit. This was a remarkable movie. I recommend it to everyone. I added this to my list of favorite movie animation, this is currently ranked #3 for me. (1. Toki Wo Kakero Shoujo 2. Spirited Away)
Read at the sourcedatOneperson
This movie is definitely a slow one to start out, but then it gets faster and more interesting towards the end. Still, this movie is not the greatest ever, definitely not the greatest.
The "adventure" part of it was well written, but the movie wasn't directed as viewers were looking for. The story connected lots of different individual character stories quite effectively and it made for a good ending.
Read at the sourcekiriska
I started watching this movie knowing little more than that it was directed by Satoshi Kon, and even though I'm a fan of the man's work in general, I must say I was pleasantly surprised.
STORY - In brief, Tokyo Godfathers is a heart-warming Christmas story about family. Slightly elaborated, it's a rather unique slice-of-life movie featuring a less-than-average family. Sure, inspiration was taken from an old western film (3 Godfathers), but I haven't seen it, and I don't think having seen it would have affected the charm of this one. (Other than the bare bones, the details of the two movies are vastly different anyway.) Though thoroughly punctuated with reminders of how hard life can be, the movie was fun, comedic at times, and pretty darn feel-good, reflecting the general optimism associa…
Read at the sourcemaybelletea
I just sort of randomly requested this from my library on a whim, knowing what it was about but not quite sure what to expect.
Tokyo Godfathers is the story of 3 homeless people: a tranvestite, a runaway teenager, and an ashamed father. On Christmas Eve, they encounter a baby in the trash that was seemingly abandoned by its mother. The soon began to take care of it, some more eagerly than others. However, taking care of this baby allowed them to remind them the reality of their situations, and what to maturely do about it.
The one thing about the story and that it was very realistic. The characters were really believable. There was no one overly perky or unrealistic, they just acted and talked like regular people, and that was pretty refreshing considering all the generic stereotypical…
Read at the sourceFaust721
From the creator of Perfect Blue comes Tokyo Godfathers.
Story: This story is about 3 homeless people (a washed-up father/husband, a homo, and a runaway teen) during the Christmas Holidays. The story gets going when they find an abandoned baby at a dump site. Even though one of them wants to raise the baby himself, they knew that they couldn't, so they go on a search for the baby's parents. As this search goes on, they start to learn about each others past's and we see how it ties into the present.
While it may seem like a pretty straight forward concept, Kon Satoshi manages to fully utilize it by putting all these twists and turn that keeps the movie exciting. What makes the story so special is how Satoshi manages to portray the homeless urban hood and how he cleverly ties everyone's pa…
Read at the source