The lighting and reflections are the art's greatest asset as they often have the ability to enhance the story itself (one particular scene has Satsuki's confused face mirrored in the bus that her love interest is leaving in). Even when it's only "pretty good" by Hanasaku Iroha standards, it still looks better than many animated films released these days. The audio-visual quality fares much better. Why not show us something new about the character, or instead spend that time developing the relationship between Satsuki and Ohana's father? There was plenty of potential here for something great and in the end it is pushed aside for the familiar. One of her sisters runs away at random, generating us ten minutes of the inn screaming and searching for her, only to end with the tired message of "Nako is mature". The worst offender is the Nako subplot, based on her issues at home and relationship with her siblings. It's merely a repetition of what we have already seen. I just have to wonder, why? Ohana and the rest of the inn already had plenty of focus in the main series. Maybe we could have if the movie didn't spend its time on irrelevant subplots. Why does she fall in love with him so quickly? And why is an adult like him even interested in a highschooler suffering from a severe case of teen angst? Who really knows. Large sequences of time are skipped by in a flash, numerous questions are left unanswered, and we never do fully understand the relationship between Satsuki and Ohana's father. This naturally creates issues when the runtime of the movie is just 60 minutes. Ohana, Minko and the rest of the inn are often given the spotlight instead for whatever reason. The biggest problem however is that Satsuki's story only takes up about one-third of the overall story. It's a shame that an otherwise intelligent story had to be bogged down this way. It doesn't always have to be two characters screaming at each other. I understand that it is mainly a story about teenage girls, but come on, you can convey emotion through thoughtful dialogue instead of this nonsense. Why do they always do this? Home Sweet Home is a better story than that. Plenty of screaming, crying, and more screaming for your hearing pleasure. Works, of course, it is impeded by melodrama. There is a reason for us to care this time, and there is finally a message to be drawn by the end of the story, unlike the ambiguous "Huuuh?" of before.īeing a product of P.A. Few stories evolve the conflict beyond existential angst and into parenthood.
Growing up has always been the central theme of the series, but the movie achieves it with much more clarity than the TV series. We see the beauty of childbirth (reminiscent of Mamoru Hosoda's "Wolf Children") and the toils of an adolescent girl trying to find adulthood in a world alien to her. There's an inherent sense of maturity to Home Sweet Home that was not present in the TV series. Like mother, like daughter, or so they say. We see in greatest detail how Satsuki met Ohana's father, but the message is never in the story itself - it's how it relates to Ohana's own struggles. While cleaning one of the inn's storage rooms, Ohana happens upon a set of diaries from her mother, telling the story of Satsuki's rebellious teenage years to the birth of Ohana. (no indication is really given as to when), Home Sweet Home decides to show us a little bit more of an oft neglected character: Ohana's mother, Satsuki.
Taking place somewhere in the time-frame of the TV series Most of what was frustrating about the main series remains here. Hanasaku Iroha: Home Sweet Home is not one of those movies, but do still keep your expectations in check before digging in. There's an undeniable sense of indifference whenever we hear that a spin-off movie has been greenlit, and who can blame us when "movie" often simply means "bad adaptation with a couple new scenes". Do we really need another addition to an already concluded story? Not usually. We often look at movie spin-offs as unnecessary, thoughtless, and maybe even a little bit greedy.