ANN Tomomi Mochizuki page
My average ranking: 7.33
| Director Pantheon: Tomomi Mochizuki▲▼ | Rating▲▼ |
| Dirty Pair Flash 2 (OAV) | Decent |
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| Dirty Pair Flash 3 (OAV) | Decent |
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| Here Is Greenwood (OAV) | Very good |
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| House of Five Leaves (TV) | Masterpiece |
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House of Five Leaves is precisely the sort of series that makes me a fan of anime - it's strange, it's surprising, it's beautiful to look at, it's full of wit yet isn't comedy and, above all, it has memorable adult characters, all heavily burdened with regrets and desires, who propel a story full of incident and emotion, bitterness and irony. They're all villains, cowards and losers, and I loved each and every one of them. Combining grotesquerie and beauty, the artwork happily departs from anime conventions and nicely evokes the Edo period. Because it so suggests that era, and because it captures a beauty amidst the ugliness, I think it surpasses the visual style of its noitaminA contemporary Tatami Galaxy. It doesn't hurt that each episode starts with the beguiling song, Sign of Love:
Miwatasenai chizu ga aru
Tohou ni kureru hodo hiroku
Shiru koto akiramesou ni naru
When it gets to the bolded section the female singer's voice drops in pitch and gives me goose-bumps in the process. Beautiful stuff |
| Kimagure Orange Road: The Movie | Good |
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| Yokohama Kaidashi Kikou: Quiet Country Cafe (OAV) | Good |
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Continues the slow-paced, gentle yet emotionally engaging storytelling of the earlier OAV without ever quite reaching its levels of sublime beauty. The artwork has a more recent style with prominent outlines and a brighter palette. The effect is to make the characters seem less a part of the landscape and diminishes the sense of time suspended. Extended review of the two OAVs |
