Josee, the Tiger and the Fish

I watched this in theater recently and decided to write a review, will keep it simple for those who's curious about this movie. In summary, this romance drama is pretty standard as it goes, so if you expect something new or something compelling then you won't find it here. Animated movie formats in general are fast paced due to its short run time; relying on common tropes, character archetypes and melodrama to convey the story quickly and efficiently; it simply can't be fleshed out like a TV-series, and this movie is no different. Of course, this isn't a bad thing - what I want to addresshere is to know your expectations before watching this (and pretty much anything else). I personally watched this because I want a light-hearted casual show with nice interactions between the main duo. And yes it is a cute show which satisfied my needs, so if you watch the trailer and like what it has to offer then you should definitely give it a chance. Next up are my personal thoughts of this movie with no spoilers. The main duo Josee and Tsuneo got to know each other during an accidental encounter. Tsuneo, as a poor college student, was offered a job right after by Josee's grandmother - it is to look after Josee and keep her safe from the outside world due to her condition. It wasn't easy for Tsuneo to earn the trust of a wary and awkward Josee who's confined from the outside world most of the time, but eventually he got through. And from there Tsuneo slowly helped Josee to see the world that she always wished to see; became more independent and overcome her physical condition that greatly hindered her life. You should be able to guess how the rest goes. The movie doesn't waste time elaborating, it set up the story and the arcs quickly and efficiently. You will feel the quick pacing of the film (due to the format's limitation like I mentioned at the start), but it isn't feel rushed. The first half introduced our characters and established the duo's dynamic, and then it shifted gears right away into the second half where the drama starts surfacing. The general flow of the movie was decent from start to finish - exciting and cute at first, then it gets heavier during the drama act, goosebump during the climax and lighthearted in the end with a happy ending. I was pleased with the movie's general execution, although the first act where it established the duo's dynamic was kinda short in my opinion. Tsuneo and Josee are classic characters you usually see in a romance drama, but what matters is the execution, and it was well done. Tsuneo is a hardworking college student who loves ocean life and want it to be his career goal. While Josee dreams of exploring the outside world, especially the sea. She loves drawing and her topic has always been about the world under the water. It is the love of the sea that draws these two together, and from here we see their relationship started to develop. Tsuneo is level-headed, matured and responsible; while Josee is a bit hot-tempered, and awkward due to lack of interaction with the outside world (which her overprotective grandmother played a big part in). But as she grew more comfortable around Tsuneo, she became expressive, happy, easily excited (and sometimes embarrassed) over the most mundane things of the outside world and it especially peaked when she saw the sea. It melted me a bit seeing these sides of Josee. During the second half we will see how the duo helped each other to overcome their struggles and life misfortunes. I won't dwell too much into this, but it was well paced and ended on a good note like I mentioned last paragraph. The relationship dynamic between Tsuneo and Josee for the most part can be described as cute and light-hearted. Their interactions and dialogues remind me of Korean romance for some reason - short remarks; bashfulness between the two, especially from Josee as she became fond of Tsuneo, but for the most part, light-hearted and pleasant. Their voice acting are on point as well. There's only one gripe I had - I wished there was more development and connection between the two as they talk about their love for the sea because I love sea themes in general and unfortunately the movie doesn't cover this too much, which was a bummer. The supporting cast are nothing special. They serve only as plot device, nothing more, nothing less. There's a love triangle but it existed only to move the story forward and the melodrama was rather awkward but ultimately it served its purpose and wasn't dragged out, which was a relief. Moving on. Art, music & general direction was nice. You can check out Eve's MV Aono waltz to have a feel of everything. Unfortunately, 90% of the eye candy visuals and the most beautiful shots are all in that 4-minute MV so you won't find much more in the movie. Don't expect it to be stunning every frame like Makoto Shinkai's productions. All in all, this is an enjoyable show and I had a good time watching it. Hopefully this review will help you make up your mind and have a casual, realistic view of what this movie is like.

[tl;dr is at the bottom of the review] Josee, the Tiger and the Fish is a movie that tells a story heavily focused on Josee (the disabled girl shown on the poster) and Tsuneo (the boy who walks besides Josee shown on the poster). When you saw this movie's poster for the first time, you might be thinking that this movie will tell one hell of a sad story. You're not wrong, but you're not completely right either if you think like that. My suggestion if you ever wanted to watch this movie, do not take your expectations too highly. I've heard a lot of positivethings about this movie before, and that obviously made me expecting things highly from this movie. The movie did not live up to my expectations, but it did have it's own redeemable quality to be called "good". Now, let's get to the review: Story: 5/10 The story is as generic drama as it could get. As I've mentioned as an opening before, this movie is heavily focused on Tsuneo and Josee. Why did I say it's generic? Because this kind of story has been seen and used lot in the drama romance genre. [This is a paragraph worth of recap of the plot. You can skip it] It's a story about Josee who has a deficiency locked up by her overprotective grandma in her own house for too long, and that made her has a dream to see the outside world by herself. Tsuneo on the other hand, is a "normal" boy who has a part-time job that needed him to explore the ocean and has a dream to become a student in a foreign university. One night, Tsuneo came across Josee by accident and that somehow made Tsuneo became closer to her. Their journey exploring the outside begins there, and guess what? Yes, they slowly grow a feeling into each other. Okay, the main problem is not how the story is oftenly seen on the screen, but it's the way how the movie tells the story. There's no proper explanations on how and why these things on the screen happening. Things just happens like that, and it tricks you into thinking the movie has explained the important parts when it's actually not. I sat there watching confused with a question like "How? Why?" most of the time. Being "mainstream" is not enough to call this kind of story generic, but looking at how lacking the storytelling is kind of backing my statement about it being generic. The pacing on the other hand, is kind of balanced in a way even if it feels a bit forced sometimes. The flow from the happy introduction, to melancholic complication, then going back to the happy vibes in the end feels nice and balanced. As I said, Nothing bad, nothing good. Art & Animation: 9/10 Probably the best aspect of the movie. The artstyle is absolutely smooth and detailed, it made my eyes almost reached the orgasmic point. Animation is also feels and looks smooth. I'm sure this alone could make you hooked into watching the movie more. Sound: 8/10 The voice acting is very good. The dialect that Josee spoke feels natural, and every other voice acting of the characters here is also feels natural, even the screams could make some goosebumps here and there. The sfx is nice, and then the music. Eve takes part in this, and boi it did make the show better. I almost shed a tear when Eve's music starts to play in the middle of the movie as it fits perfectly with the scene that the song placed in. Character: 5/10 Even though the movie is heavily focused on Josee and Tsuneo, they both did not have a proper background, but I'd say it's still tolerable. Their backgrounds might be little, but their journey on the movie could make the viewer cares about them. The other characters though? They seem to be exist only to be a plot device. No proper backgrounds and not enough screentime to make the viewer at least lay an eye on them. There's one scene that made me scratched my head out of confusion. One character that is supposed to be an important character, just got removed without an explanation. Imagine one neutral scene where you're not supposed to expect something, the show gave you a sudden turn anyway. It's not a shock value, but it's still something. Something to confuse the hell out of your mind. The scene is supposed to be "powerful" but it's just, they don't seem to even care with the characters other than Josee and Tsuneo. Also, the whole "love rival" just came out of nowhere, and the show expects the viewer to care about it?. I mean, again, because there is no proper explanation on it. Enjoyment: 6/10 Even though this movie did confuse the heck out of me, and dissapointed me since i had high expectations on it, it somehow still made me almost sheds a tear. And that artstyle, my eyes highly appreciates it. Also, Josee's cute not gonna lie. Overall: 6.6 - (7: Good) tl;dr - This is a heartwarming and cute movie. Best watched with your close ones and enjoys it together. Even if this would made the viewer confused with it's way of storytelling, but it could still make the viewer cares about the two main duo of the movie, as it is their focus of the show. It's a good watch overall even tho there's a lot of downs from the movie. And yes, i'm sorry if this looks like a rant rather than a review.

"Grandma, the outside is not scary at all." Josee, the Tiger and the Fish may have had a slightly bumpy start, but it knows its own strengths and uses it to build its momentum. At its apex, this film shines in all its beauty and fills you up with all sorts of emotions. What you will witness from this anime is the clear result of a passionate team that knows how to delicately craft a story that is able to stand out among the crowd of modern anime. Josee's story contains several tropes, including cliche ones, but it is able to execute them when time is appropriateand the result is of praise. The main characters, Josee and Tsuneo, got to meet each other through a coincidence, which is nothing special but certainly not bad. Their relationship went off to a rocky beginning, however, when both of them realized their similar interest for the ocean, it kicked off the steady climb in terms of their understanding of each other. That is great and all, but it was not yet what I was looking for. Josee always had a love for drawing of the ocean and fishes. She even dreams of her swimming as a mermaid in an underwater world with fishes. The part of the story that heavily stuck out to me was the scene where Josee reads a storybook to the children. Every page of the storybook was painted by Josee; every page of the storybook encapsulates Josee's love for the ocean. The story? An analogy of her dearest memories with Tsuneo. It really pulled my heartstrings. I teared up. Alongside the story, Josee featured spectacular technical qualities. From the art to the voice acting, there is nothing I can really complain about at all. The soft lineart along with a colorful palette really suited what this film is about. They were consistent with it, and it allowed for dynamic facial expressions as well. If I were to nitpick something real quick, it would be the 3DCG standing out at times during certain parts of the film. Although that's not too much of a concern since most of the movie uses animated drawings, I figured to still point it out as a room for improvement. Other than that, I was particularly impressed with its lighting. It's something a lot of studios tend to cut corners on, but in all honesty good lighting can give your film an entire layer of color. The OSTs for Josee were good, though I would not go out of my way to say it is breathtaking. Even so, Eve's 'Ao no Waltz' was quite powerful and incredible, what else can I really comment on. The voice acting, however, was really something else. Kaya Kiyohara really outperformed herself with the Kansai accent and the passionate immersion in her role; but that might just be me with my soft spot for Kansai accents. In a romance film, what really matters is the character dynamic. How was it? I do not think their dynamics are original in any way, but it was executed in a manner that did not feel excessively tropey and overused. Pretty much what you might see in other romance series or movies, two main characters and two supporting characters, with the two girls soon falling in love with the same guy. This dynamic faintly reminds me of shows like Toradora, but with a lot less pointless drama. The latter factor allowed me to enjoy this film much more, and I am glad for that. I found the interactions between Josee and Tsuneo to be really cute though. I am weak for blushing, but they just kept blushing in romantically adorable ways. I give them an additional 10 points for tugging my heartstring. On the whole, Josee, the Tiger and the Fish does use tropes, it does have character dynamics that have appeared in other shows before. At the same time, it features a promisingly solid story with its own times to truly shine alongside a magnificent production quality. Personally, I am biased to a cute romance couple so I enjoyed it a lot. Would I recommend it? Sure, it is a great film to just watch with a friend or even alone.

This movie sounded amazing. Evan Call's soundtracks really elevated some of the more emotional and dramatic scenes, and Eve never ceases to amaze me with how good their songs are. Studio Bones absolutely nailed the animation too; from super detailed (and really cute!) characters to beautiful scenery shots, they certainly brought their A game here. 9/10 for both Art and Sound, for sure. Unfortunately, the positives kinda stop there. What followed from an enthralling premise and a breathtaking first half-hour was a runaway train towards narrative disaster. I really wish I could tear into how poorly executed its dramatic lows were, but I want this reviewto be as spoiler-free as possible so I can hopefully warn potential watchers on what to expect. Story - 2/10 It's your run-of-the-mill romcom, sure, and it is fairly cute and heartwarming at times, but don't expect any form of realistic or sensible drama. Everything in the story conveniently happens to push the sickeningly cliched plot forward, to the point where its ludicrosity transcends into comedy. Even ignoring that, the general plot direction is so boring that I could name a dozen similar, but better executed shows. Bunny Girl Senpai's movie comes to mind - the dramatic climax and aftermath is pretty much identical, but the build-up to that in this movie was far shallower and more contrived. The movie then becomes obsessed with digging the drama hole further and further, layering more and more tragedies onto the characters until it barely feels tragic anymore. As if it couldn't get worse, this is followed up with the cheesiest rendition of 'Hopes and Dreams will Save the World!' that I've ever seen. Ah yes, hopes and dreams are able to resolve physical and practical impossibilities. As long as we believe, we'll get the perfect relationship out of an extremely frayed and toxic one just 10 minutes prior! But that leads me on to... Characters - 3/10 No, Josee making snarky, rude quips at random points in the show does not make her a well-written character. She is exaggerated past any reasonable point - I get the defensiveness and spite towards the world around her, but the movie is so quick to make 180 degree switches between that and her completely happy and trusting side so... anything gives? The male protagonist gives me heavy harem MC vibes - dense, overly nice for no reason, and somehow every female in the show falls in love with him, despite completely missing backstories for some of them. Speaking of which, the side characters were somehow done even worse. Not a single one managed to remotely stand out, and got so little development and screentime that I couldn't even remember their names. The characters are only marginally better than the plot, but that's honestly because nothing can get worse than the plot. Overall/Enjoyment - 5/10 All in all, it's not all bad. The story occasionally hints at the start of potentially good ideas, and its latter half makes some attempt to link to its promising first half-hour. But virtually everything that made that first half-hour stand out - the main duo's hobbies, constraints, and budding friendship (which was actually really nicely developed) - gets thrown out of the window once the drama hits. For such a talented production team, it's a real letdown. At least I got a couple nice additions to my playlist out of this.