Tokyo Goddofazazu
Tags: psychedelic, comedy, flashback

Plot synopsis:
One Christmas Eve three people, a middle-aged alcoholic named Gin, a former drag queen Hana and a dependent runaway girl Miyuki, discover an abandoned newborn while looking through the garbage. Deposited with the unnamed baby is a note asking the finder to take good care of her and a bag containing clues to the parent's identity. The trio sets out to find the baby's parents. The baby is named Kiyoko (清子), literally meaning "pure child" as she is found on Christmas Eve.
Outside a cemetery, the group encounters a high-ranking yakuza trapped under his car. The man happens to know the owner of the club Kiyoko's mother used to work in; he is getting married to the man's daughter that day. At the wedding, the groom tells them that the baby's mother is a former bar girl named Sachiko. He gives them Sachiko's address, but the party is interrupted when a maid, revealed to be a Latin American hit man in disguise, attempts to shoot the bride's father with a Tokarev TT-33. The hit man kidnaps Miyuki and the baby and takes them back to his home. There, Miyuki befriends the hit man's wife and shows her some pictures of her family.
Hana searches for Miyuki and Kiyoko while Gin takes care of an old homeless man whom he finds dying in the street. After giving Gin a little red bag, the old man peacefully passes away. Some teenagers show up and beat Gin and the deceased old man. Meanwhile, Hana finds the girls and they go off to find a place to stay.
Hana takes them to a club he used to work at. Gin, who was found by another member of the club, is also there. The trio sets out to find Sachiko's house. They're informed of the unhappy relationship between Sachiko and her husband. The group rests at a store until they are told to leave by the clerk. Hana collapses, and Gin and Miyuki bring him to the hospital. At the hospital, Gin finds his daughter, working as a nurse. Hana berates Gin in front of his daughter and storms out of the hospital. Miyuki follows with Kiyoko.
Hana and Miyuki find Sachiko about to jump off a bridge. Sachiko insists that her husband got rid of the baby without her knowledge, and they return it to her. Meanwhile, Gin finds Sachiko's husband, who reveals that Kiyoko is actually a baby that Sachiko stole from the hospital. They chase after Sachiko and the baby. After an intense car chase through the city, Miyuki follows Sachiko to the top of a building, where Sachiko reveals she became pregnant, thinking it would bring her closer to her husband. When the baby was stillborn, she decided to kidnap Kiyoko from the hospital, thinking, in her grief, the baby was hers. Sachiko tries to jump off the building, but her husband comes out of his apartment (just across the street) and begs her to start over with him. Sachiko jumps off nevertheless and Miyuki catches her but Sachiko accidentally drops the baby off of the building. Hana jumps after Kiyoko. He catches the baby and lands safely due to a miraculous gust of wind.
Hana, Miyuki, and Gin are taken to the hospital. Miyuki hands Gin his cigarettes and drops the old man's small red bag on the floor, revealing a winning lottery ticket. Kiyoko's real parents want to ask the trio to become her godparents. When a police inspector introduces them to the trio, the inspector is revealed to be Miyuki's father.

Review: The "miracles DO happen on Christmas" cliché is very boring and I typically don't enjoy movies that employ it, but this is a very different kind of Christmas movie.We are given three homeless characters with complex personalities and backgrounds, who are as endearing as they are repellent.
We learn the secrets that made these people homeless, we learn about the workings of human shame and desperation, and we learn that "miracles DO happen on Christmas." But in the least cheesy way possible!The plot is very slow-moving, but still, it is interesting and very carefully laid out.
This would be a very compelling live-action movie, but the use of animation adds so much visual interest, particularly the expressive (and sometimes hideous!!) face of Hana, the gangly transvestite.
Having suffered through the painfully pretentious and shallow, pseudo-Lynchian mess of Perfect Blue, I was understandably skeptical about watching another film by Satoshi Kon (I have not yet seen Millennium Actress, but am now quite intrigued to do so).
Tokyo Godfathers (a title which at first struck me as belonging most probably to a pseudo-psychological mafia thriller) was not only a pleasant surprise; it was the best anime feature I've seen in many years, probably since Ghost in the Shell, excluding anything by Hayao Miyazaki.
Like the classic Grave of the Fireflies, Tokyo Godfathers struck me as unusual in the fact that it draws much from European cinema  English, Irish, German or Italian  while most commercial anime features try to mimic American film-making.
Kon triumphs, like in his excellent series Paranoia Agent, by not succumbing to the accepted prototypes and standards of how characters should look in an anime film; the lead characters in the film are all gorgeously ugly, in a way that even Miyazaki had not yet dared to do.
Especially charming is Hana (AKA 'Uncle Bag'), the golden-hearted transvestite, who supplies much of the film's comic relief but also some of its most touching moments.Tokyo Godfathers  despite some far-fetched but amusing plot twists and coincidences  is at its core a very simple story, a beautiful little story about family, love and friendship.
This movie is not only a technical masterpiece of the Japanese animation style, but can also rival a good independent live-action film in its storytelling.
As a Westerner, I was astonished at how the homeless characters adapted to Japanese traditional practices for their survival.The story of "Tokyo Godfathers" is much more compelling and heartwarming than Kon's previous films, "Perfect Blue" and "Milennium Actress", but the signature semi-realistic drawing style from his other films is still prominent.
Kon is the next Miyazaki, and I predict that he will continue to bring Japanese animation films to the international foreground years to come..
The story revolves around 3 homeless people (a middle aged man name Gin, a homosexual cross-dresser name Hana, and a teenage girl named Miyuki) who discover a newborn baby in the garbage.
Right from the start, Tokyo Godfathers was among the funniest animated features I had ever seen.The film quickly draw comparisons to Three Men and a Baby as well as the idea of the three wise men.
At the same time, the provide a touching story of three people with nothing but the clothing on their bodies going out of their way to find the child's home.If you get the chance, Tokyo Godfathers makes for the perfect holiday feature for everyone to watch.
Director Satoshi Kon has concocted a little wonder of an animated film, a character based ensemble action comedy about thwarted families, homelessness in Tokyo and strange twists of fate.
Sure, it's always possible to do these kind of things in live action (more or less) but thank God we have a filmmaker of Kon's vision applying his ample animation skills to stories like this.
Sadly, the film was not added to the IMDb until months later, so I've had to sit on my comments for some time.I'm a big fan of director Satoshi Kon. Both of his previous films feature stories and issues not normally seen in animated films.
Tokyo Godfathers, a 2003 Japanese anime from well known director Satoshi Kon (Paprika, Millennium Actress), is about an unlikely trio of homeless people that finds a baby abandoned on Christmas eve.
There are also some similarities to Dickens' Christmas Carol including numerous flashbacks and a character encountering what seems to be a future version of himself who offers him a second chance.Satoshi Kon's film is more than just a pastiche of his influences, however, he brings his own unique sensibilities to the table.
In continuing my trip into the late Satoshi Kon's all-too-small body of work (four feature films as director and one television series that is MUCH too hard to track down), I now come across this film, 2003's Tokyo Godfathers, which I unfortunately missed when it was first released and was actually the first time I had heard of the director.I was happy to finally come across a copy and pop it in...
It's a sentimental piece of pap that has the ambition to the Japanese anime answer to It's a Wonderful Life: a Christmas story that is not necessarily all about Christmas that has supernatural (or "miracle") overtones, and goes sometimes into dark places.The short of it: three homeless people, one a bearded guy with a family that he left behind, a transvestite who insists on being called a woman's name and is so flamboyant as to make Harvey Fierstein jealous, and a young runaway girl whose father is a cop.
Like many anime films and series I can think of (on the action-side Dragonball Z and on the more adult side Princess Mononoke), the story can get complicated, if not impossible to follow.
Specially when it's Christmas time and every one else is at home enjoying their Christmas while our trio is risking their lives for one baby.The movie isn't dubbed like other anime.
Yet "Have Yourself a Merry Little Christmas" is still a beautiful song and there are plenty of movies that warm the cockles of my heart when the holidays come around.I can go through the gambit of classic holiday films, each of which conjures memories.
And of course for unbridled Christmas spirit you can't go wrong with the occasionally corny Love Actually (2003) or the genuine Joyeux Noel (2005).I didn't think it would be possible to surprise when it came to Christmas films but I recently sat down to watch Tokyo Godfathers (2003) and had my inner pessimist silenced for a an hour an a half.
Still there are very few anime movies or shows that I have seen and don't at least place value in.Tokyo Godfathers is in my opinion, a valuable cultural masterpiece.
Despite adult subject matter, it is a luminous film for family audiences that has more to say about the good of human nature than say A Christmas Story, Bad Santa or even It's a Wonderful Life (1946).
The film follows their quest to reunite parents and child.What lifts this film into magical territory is that the lives of each of these homeless people would make personal day-to-day survival for most of us testing enough, without having to consider the continual needs of a baby.
Although the story is often carried along by inexplicable coincidence, it is tightly plotted and does not suffer from clunky dialogue or too much sentimentality (as can sometimes negatively affect Japanese films in my experience) -- in fact, the dialogue is superb throughout and often very funny.The music and drawing style are wonderful and the life of early 21st Century Tokyo is perfectly captured in the cityscape.
A less experimental & more grounded effort when compared to his earlier works, Tokyo Godfathers is a funny, poignant & melancholic story that unfolds without playing with the viewers' sense of reality but still packs enough twists n turns to keep them guessing.Taking place on Christmas Eve, the story of Tokyo Godfathers follows 3 homeless friends, a middle-aged alcoholic, a former drag queen & a runaway girl who while foraging through the garbage encounter an abandoned newborn and later set out to unite the baby with his parents.Co-written & directed by Satoshi Kon, his third feature film is a departure from his reality & imagination blending projects such as Perfect Blue & Millennium Actress but it still carries a sense of mystery that requires the full attention of its viewers, for the plot takes many unexpected turns before reaching its final outcome.The illustrations of the hand-drawn animation are slightly different as well but it's rich & finely detailed.
The mystery surrounding the baby's parents takes them on a series of adventures, and the ending provides a proper closure to the arcs of each one of them.Covering the themes of loss, family, abandonment, homelessness & forgiveness in a warm, accessible fashion and staying true to the Christmas spirit with a miracle that redeems all, Tokyo Godfathers unfolds at a much calmer pace than expected but the reward for sitting through it is a satisfying one.
It's Christmas time in Tokyo and as three homeless companions wander the streets, digging through trash for dinner, they come across an abandoned baby.
I certainly had no complaints, the whole story was a blast to follow, especially because you really couldn't predict where it was going.But, beneath all the craziness and oddness, Tokyo Godfathers is a character film and it pulls it off fantastically.
I know things that I have thought in the past are:They are drug addicts Veterans who have been wronged Good-for-nothing bums "Tokyo Godfathers" was co-directed by Satoshi Kon, "Millenium Actress" and "Paprika," and Shogo Furuya, Animator Director of "Millenium Actress" and "Spirited Away." It deals with three hobos who find a baby abandoned in the trash bins and the mishaps and adventures they have in trying to find the baby's mother.
We discover their stories and dreams during the search, and how the baby brings them all luck and hope in different ways.I think that all parents should sit down with their children and watch this movie.
No way, it's an x-mess film AND it makes us feel happy!Somehow totally reminded my of Night on Earth by Jim Jarmusch...What beautiful anime!If you're out for some VERY positive, funny, crazy film that has still an excellent feeling for serious drama (elements and bits) and a titanium solid story then your choice must be Tokyo Grandfathers!Description in one word: ENJOY!.
However this Japanesee animated film takes a completely different slant on the story of three people coming across a baby to be cared for during the Christmas season.
Take Three Fathers, demote them to homeless people, multiply by 100, make it anime and you get the wonderful Tokyo Godfathers.
At first I thought the animation was not great, the story was about Christmas, homeless people, drags, what could I like about it?
It's an action comedy that lets you feeling good about yourself, not depressed :)Looking back at the movie, now that I've seen it, the almost caricaturesque animation completes the very well thought script, the good music and the basic plot.It is definitely worth the watch.
This movie is very well put together - including the sequence of events, music to set the mood, kind humour, good character development, expressive animation, and a touching story.
If you start watching with an open mind and set any preconceptions on how people are supposed to behave aside, you will have a great time going through an emotional roller-coaster together with the three main characters, and will properly enjoy this movie.
Live action or anime, however, the story of two homeless men – one transgender – and a runaway who find a baby abandoned among some Tokyo garbage and their effort to unravel the mystery of its parentage plays as compellingly backwards as it does forwards.
From Satoshi Kon, the director of Millennium Actress and Perfect Blue, comes the intriguing tale of three homeless people who discover an abandoned baby while foraging through some trash.
Sometimes the voices on anime movies or TV shows can get really irritating, but not in "Tokyo Godfathers".
Dramatic, Touching and Fun. A wonderful tale taking place during the holidays about an unlikely 'family'; Gin, a middle-aged man who claims to have lost everything; Miyuki, a teenage runaway with a somewhat touchy temper; Hana, a middle-aged transsexual.When the homeless family discover an abandoned child in the garbage, they venture on to find the child's family.
I was pretty much deceived by this movie; I was hoping that the director could use the animation media as well as in perfect blue or millennium actress where all the characters can switch from a real to an unreal world without any sign or clues.
"Tokyo Godfathers," again, is an animated comedy film with a simple but realistic premise about life and coincidence.
Like Satoshi Kon always gambles with the viewers' minds, "Tokyo Godfathers" is not the same as "Paprika" or "Perfect Blue" which I've watched with various stories that cannot be predicted yet mindblowing from beginning to end.
"Tokyo Godfathers" is so different from the two works that I've mentioned earlier but this film contains sensible humor even though taking a slightly heavy theme about homeless, transvestite, discrimination, and abandoned.We follow the three major characters who have variations in their flashback and the life they lived in.
Yes, like a life always meets destiny because of that coincidence, these three characters are in an experience they will never imagine where they are just homeless people who have no place to live.
Satoshi Kon used Christmas as the main background of this film, the baby as the bearer of its blessing that determined the destiny of three main characters.
This is a great movie and one of the best Christmas films of all time.
Tokyo Godfathers is not quite as good as Paprika but it is a truly beautiful film and of Kon's work I'd go as far to say that it also is his most accessible.
The animation is beautiful and detailed if in a different way to the more surrealistic styles of Perfect Blue and Paprika, here very intricate with very expressive character design, and very fitting with the film's tone.
Set in the Christmas period, it's full of dark elements in the holiday season, yet filled with plenty of hope and goodwill as we see the characters develop and the plot unfold.The story centers around three homeless folks - Gin (Toru Emori) the middle aged drunk gambler bum, Hana (Yoshiaki Umegaki) the transvestite, and Miyuki (Aya Okamoto), the youngest of the lot, a girl who ran away from home.
And thus their road trip in and around Tokyo begins.What holds your attention, is the way our trio encounters mini episodes of adventure in their quest, ranging from meeting up with a real Godfather, to slowly unravelling their back stories, which I find both touching and believable, and more so for an animated picture.
Unlike the other anime movies ,this movie don't have a lot of action scenes , or giant robots or monsters .It's just a story of ordinary people that learns that they could be better and make heroic things thanks to the events that happen in their lives during the Christmas .
And this movie is full of sincere emotions , and works very well as comedy as much as drama .Like that wasn't enough the animation is very good ,full of details in the scenery and the characters .
Synopsis: Three homeless people in Tokyo - Hana (a wonderful transvestite)Gin (a protective soul) and 16 year old Miyuki find a baby in the trash on Christmas Eve. Gin and Miyuki are prosaic and want to take her to the police but sentimnental Hana (abandoned himself as a child) wants to find her family.
Tokyo Godfathers, by Shogo Furuya and Satoshi Kon, is an anime film so content to be mediocre that it is dispiriting to watch.
`Tokyo Godfathers' is not, as the title would suggest, a film about the Japanese mafia, but rather a sentimental fable about three homeless people  a destitute gamble, a lovesick transvestite and an ill-tempered runaway  who find an abandoned newborn babe, wrapped in swaddling clothes and lain in a dumpster, on Christmas Day.
Sure there are lots of ridiculous coincidences as others here have pointed out but that's part of the humor of the film.This story of three homeless people finding a baby in the trash and their adventures locating the parents is more like a non-Miyazaki studio Ghibli film then your average anime.
Although not quite up to par to Miyazaki efforts, Tokyo Godfathers surprised with it's good story lines, entertainment values, and background animation settings.Lighting effects were very well done in many scenes while motion maybe not as much so but above satisfactory.
This rare Japanese Christmas anime movie from Satoshi Kon shows the theme of "coincidences".
It's Christmas Eve in Tokyo, three homeless people just found an abandoned baby while searching in some trash.
This movie also has one of the biggest 'twist' ending in a film that would not only surprise the characters, but also the audiences.
Set in winter in Tokyo this film follows the lives of three homeless people, one an alcoholic gambler, one a transvestite and one a runaway teenaged girl.
In the end I bit the bullet and watched Tokyo Godfathers and wished I hadn't put it off for so long.The story may be a little unconventional, both for anime films and also Christmas films, but Kon makes it work.
If you don't believe in such things, you can take it as serendipity or just a story with several happy endings.The film itself is a little different from Kon's other works.
Although this Christmas film was inspiring because of three homeless people trying to find the baby's parents and like honestly they looked after her so well.
Kon captures the beguiling neon glow of Tokyo in the film's many night scenes, turning the city into a magical setting for a tale of Christmas miracles..