Omohide Poro-Poro / Only Yesterday (1991)

Review: Just the other day, i lent my gf a Japanese animation film, Omohide Poro Poro (literally, Memories Like Falling Rain Drops) or best known by its English title, Only Yesterday. I was shocked beyond beliefs that my gf fell asleep watching it. I was shocked because i loved the film so much, which why i had lent it to my gf in the first place.

True, that the film was a real slow, true, that the film doesn't offer anything in terms of "dramatic" scenes, but, somehow it had earned a special place in my heart for its complete take on daily life of a typical working woman who found her love while she remembers fragments from her childhood memories. Complete in a sense that it could captured the whole emotional aspects of human being. It's funny, it's sad, it's uplifting, and heck, it has one of the best ending ever, that it was almost put me to tears - the song helped greatly - (i'm not trying to spoil the fun, but there's a YouTube video for it, just search for "Only Yesterday ending theme", though i won't give it directly to you).

In this film, we follow the story of Taeko, 27, unmarried, and had spent most of her life in Tokyo. On one summer, she decides to take another trip to visit her elder sister's in-laws in the rural countryside, where she finds herslef nostalgic and wistful for her childhood self. The scenery was amazing and breathtaking and it was based on the real rural Japan. It is said that the train station still looks exactly the same, and it shows that there's infinitely more than Tokyo, Shibuya, or Shinkanshen in Japan. The animations were created after the voices were recorded which had procuded a life-like facial expressions, even being animated. And, even though that i'm a male, i could really easily connect myself to Taeko as the film's length and characterization allows me to do so.

I still have no idea why my gf fell asleep during the film.

In my opinion, it is one of the best full-length anime i've ever seen, and there are many memorable scenes that really put me through a full appreciation (determined by my absolute silence, eyes glued intently to the screen, and breathing were few and far between). One that responsible the most in putting me through such state is the scene where Taeko remembers the only time she was slapped by her father. A simple, everyday scene, and contains only a single slap, but my, the emotional impact that i felt at the moment was as if i was the one being slapped.

Really, if you liked Japan, and been craved to go there someday, or if you really enjoyed a real-life drama, give this film a chance, a two hours plus is nothing. You may find it loving it as much as i do.

My Rating: ***1/2 / ****

PS: According to Wikipedia, this film was charted at #2 as the most requested film to be released to the DVD in the US.