Did you read that synopsis? Did it not sound like a rejected Dr Who script? Did you wonder why there would be a city that thrives on pollution? Is it the only city on the whole world? If so, why are there people living outside of it? In fact, why would anyone live in it, considering it looks kinda grimy and empty and not a lot of fun? Did you think I was just making this whole thing up and that I do not have an honest face?!
Oh, lose the questions! Wonderful Days is not a film that makes a lot of sense and its characters are rather two dimensional, and not just in an animated sense. They are brooding and a wee bit bland. Sure you know sparks are gonna fly between rebel Jay and his childhood sweetheart Shua but seeing yet another flick trading on the former-lovers-now-on-opposite-sides-of-the-fence thing really doesn’t automatically make the heart sing or the blood boil. As for the plot’s environmental and class concerns — they are fairly typical of anime.
All of this may make this movie sound like a ‘nothing to see here’ flick. Which would be the wrong impression.
Wonderful Days derives its strengths from its lush and colourful visuals and a melancholy soundtrack. The emotional depth of the film stems from the combination of these two elements and tends to fill all that is missing in the characterisations. The long title sequence, where Jay rides a kind of slinky motorcycle through a ruined landscape, is visually and musically wistful enough to make up for more than a dozen klunky romantic scenes and meaningful looks.
There are many such moments throughout the film and the effect is rather like — for me, anyhow — Johnny Cash’s cover of Nine Inch Nails Hurt. Cash’s austere, stripped back version reveals a whole new sense of vulnerability and an aching sense of mortality that just wasn’t there in the booming original. Here, the visuals and sound reveal precisely the same things in the characters and story that, in lesser hands, would have gone unnoticed. Moments which would usually be all ‘yawn’ and ‘what interesting navel lint I have’ are lifted by the strikingly emotive visuals and thoughtful use of music and song.
The end result is a film that may frustrate on a plot and character level, but which nonetheless leaves the viewer feeling bittersweet and somewhat moved. Obviously the title is both cynical and deeply felt — the future the film reveals is not pretty, but as long as people can yearn for, and possibly achieve, better things, as long as love can spring up in unlikely scenarios, then days can still be wonderful.
It’s a nice thought.
