It was very beautiful, but also quite derivative

Rating: 8/10 (10 November 2018)

Watching the trailer I thought this is going to be like Voices of a Distant Star or the myriad of similar anime since. Same nice scenery, piano music, long space and time communication , the touching of two people's souls (of course, high school boy and girl). And it was! Up until half of the movie. Then the original idea of the script kicked in and saved the story. I have to say that for people who have never watched Japanese anime this should be quite beautiful, but for long time fans it touches all the right buttons in a sort of mechanical and predictable way.
It is a very beautiful romantic fantasy, but it sure felt very derivative. I know nothing is truly original, but as the movie ended (in a quite predictable manner), I wanted a little more - I don't know what. Perhaps more than the cardboard characters or the dusk lit countryside scenery with the piano music. The only interesting character for me was the senior waitress from where Taki worked. The rest were all the childish Japanese cliches that you see in all the anime.