Stephan Hammond It is an exhilarating, distressing, funny and profound film, with one of the more memorable film scores in years,

Patience Watson One of those movie experiences that is so good it makes you realize you've been grading everything else on a curve.

Kinley This movie feels like it was made purely to piss off people who want good shows

Walter Sloane Mostly, the movie is committed to the value of a good time.

CinemaClown The third feature film from Makoto Shinkai presents the writer-director blending elements of fantasy, sci-fi & romance into another ambitious coming-of-age tale that astonishes on a technical scale yet is marred in the storytelling department by the same issues that plagued his first film.The story of Children Who Chase Lost Voices (also known as Journey to Agartha) follows a young girl who, accompanied by one of her school teachers, embarks on a life-changing journey to a mythical place called Agartha to find her lost friend, only to encounter cruelty & beauty in the world beneath.Written, produced, directed, photographed & edited by Makoto Shinkai (best known for 5 Centimeters per Second & Your Name), the film begins on an interesting note, hinting a sense of mystery from its opening moments, and Agartha is truly a sight to behold but the longer it goes on, the more tedious the journey becomes.Shinkai's imagination is impressive and he does well to translate the storyboarded images on the film canvas, but the slow narration hurts the overall experience as the story overstays its welcome and feels quite overlong. Characters appeared to be intriguing at first but interest in their journey fizzles out over the course of its runtime.The animation is top-notch as expected and Agartha has that otherworldly feel & vibe to it but its never ending exhibition of set pieces becomes tiring after a while. More often than not, they seem like distraction rather than an integral element of the plot. The inspiration behind Agartha is obvious but the events unfolding there aren't always riveting.On an overall scale, Children Who Chase Lost Voices starts on a promising note but fails to keep the interest alive until the end. Its structure is a mess, characters are one-dimensional, and many moments that should've ended up on the editing room floor make it to the final print, thus slowing down its narrative by an extent. It's an extravagant effort from Shinkai but it just isn't as rewarding or satisfying as expected.

Shizuoka This is a hugely ambitious piece of work. It scores highly on design, and the attempts at creating a fleshed out setting are clear, but numerous unexplained plot conveniences, an overly long run time, and the constant sense that you've seen this done better, ultimately prevent this from standing out from the crowd.The Ghibli parallels are striking. The design of the lead characters (cute, furry sidekick included), the musical cues, and the lush green landscapes. Even more so is the look, feel, even movement, of the numerous supernatural beings. Labelling them Ghibli off casts would be too harsh, but to call them anything other than "heavily inspired by" would be ignoring a patent truth.That's not to say the influences are a problem. For the most part the film looks gorgeous. What held it back mostly was the lack of satisfying development of the Underworld's back story. There was no shortage of explanations, but it was exposition heavy and generally raised more questions. Why did the surface kings and emperor's need to use the Underworld's knowledge and treasure to rule? How did they do so? If their pillaging went on for hundreds of years, why did it take the Underworld so long to decide, at the drop of a hat, to keep them out? And where did those crystals come from suddenly? Asuka's nonsensical behaviour, like chilling on her backside until the sun went down, despite having to get somewhere before the night demons came out, was really jarring. It was impossible to relate to her need to sit and ponder her plight (or perhaps she was just tired) when there was deadly danger she was fully aware of, had just been reminded to avoid. The drying up of a river when it provided the only form of defence was obviously for dramatic effect, but running further and further into increasingly thinning water, when it was the only form of protection, is not something any sane human being would do.These were not the only plot holes, and unfortunately there were enough to take me out of the film and have me making a mental note to rewatch some Ghibli. The overriding message of coping with loss was not a bad one, but the overall narrative was clunky and not emotionally engaging. I doubt I'll recall much of this film two or three weeks down the line, and will unlikely ever rewatch it. It did look pretty, though.

ThatAnimeSnob (ThatAnimeSnob) So this girl sees these monsters and is saved by a boy from the underworld. And she goes there, and she is chased around by some freaks and… What is the point of all this? Disappointed! This is how I felt after I finished this film. Wanna know why?1) The director Makoto Shinkai is quite famous for his tragic romantic tales. Voices of a Distant Star and 5cm per Second are among st the few romances even an uncaring bastard like myself enjoyed. So it was reasonable to expect yet another film regarding a tragic romance. Because, duh, Shinkai never made anything else. And to my amazement he now did. And it wasn't good.2) The studio Studio Comics Wave is new but has made an impressive work so far. The thing is, with this film it feels like it is trying to rip-off Ghibli Studio instead of trying to find an identity or style of its own. I had to check three times to make sure this WASN'T a Ghibli production. I mean, IT IS SO ALIKE! In my mind there can be only one Ghibli and now I see someone trying to become its copycat? This is an outrage! Yes, pretty damn good visuals and soundtrack, but they all look and sound like a damn robbery from one of the most famous studios around. I couldn't enjoy the overall film because of it.3) The story You think the similarities to Ghibli stop only at the visuals? Heck no, the story itself was a mix of various Ghibli works. At the same time it is hardly as captivating as those films, with far less context, complexity, interesting situations, and plot. So not only it is an imitation, it is also a bad one. If you just sit back and think of the plot of the film you will immediately realize how linear, simple, and eventually forgettable it was.4) The characters Not even one of the characters in the film is memorable or interesting. They all play their generic roles to the fullest yet none of them manage to stand out from their counterparts in a myriad other children fantasy stories. To the most part all you see is the heroine being chased around by monsters and being saved by a handsome fighter from a magical land. It couldn't get any cornier. I saw fifty times more in the far similar premise of Escaflowne, where everyone there was far more complicating than he appeared to be at first. And in case you try to excuse it by saying this is a movie and not a series to demand drastic character development, then I will reply that in this case a movie should not be full of useless characters. Yet look at this, there is a whole school filled with children, a whole village filled with people, a whole magical land filled with creatures and you get nothing out of them. They are just standing there, irrelevant to the main plot, and boring since they are not doing anything.5) The motivation There is no clear goal for most of the movie. The characters are running around almost apathetically, without really caring or making us care about whatever they want to accomplish. And even when they accomplish it, it feels hollow and pointless, without nothing interesting for you to remember about. There is absolutely no emotional engagement with whatever is going on in it.6) Plausibility Furthermore, the movie hardly tries to convince you of whatever happens. Monsters attack our world, the army attacks them with helicopters, and nobody in the surrounding areas besides the heroine takes notice of them. And then the movie ends and she returns and her mother has apparently popped in the story, and she keeps living her life like nothing matters. So what was the point of all that?Although most viewers will probably just stare at the cool visuals and vote this a 9 or 10, I am a far harder to please man. I expect emotional engagement, development of the initial concept, some plot twist to be taken back for a few seconds, some characters who manage to escape their stereotype, something that doesn't feel like a lesser rehash of older productions. Well I got none of the above in this one. It was hollow, boring, and made Makoto Shinkai to look like a failed Miyazaki wannabe when he always had his own style and identity. His specialty always was tragic romances, he was so good at it, he had no reason to stray off to something far more childish and stupid like this. Although he tried to pull of something similar here with the myth of Izanami and Izanagi, he failed completely to make it plausible and engaging. His previous works were all quite realistic to the most part, without silly magical powers to offer panacea to any problem encountered. But this? This is a stupid romantic fairy tale for little girls (yes, girls, not even boys) and one so generic that you will forget as soon as you watch the next generic fairy tale that comes along. Heck, watching a low-budget stupid Barbie 3D movie is more than enough to get over it!Completely disappointed! Go back to realistic romances Shinkai! Leave behind there stupid magical lands! And above all don't try to grow a beard and act like Miyazaki. Be yourself.

Cazre Thomas I will keep this simple, when I first started watching I sensed something familiar about the movie. The art style felt familiar and the story so far felt familiar. Then I put my nose on it, it felt like a movie from Hiyao Miyazaki and Studio Ghibli. I stuck with it but I noticed someone in the movie looked and seemed way too much like Haku from Spirited Away. The film started to feel like Princess Mononoke/Spirited Away a little too much but I stuck with it. The last straw was when a scene played out almost exactly like one out of Princess Mononoke. If you haven't seen the two previous mentioned films you may like it but too me it felt too unoriginal.