Okko's Inn

Jaces_Sanctum★ 9

This film is a hidden gem. Before seeing it, I wasn't all that interested in the film. I entered a giveaway for free tickets on social media just for the sake of it, so when I actually won, I decided to take my little sister with me to at least let her have a fun experience watching a kid's movie with me. I wasn't expecting anything special. I was wrong. 12-year-old Oriko "Okko" Seki is visiting a festival in the countryside when she gets in an accident, and tragedy strikes. Now having recovered from her physical injuries, Okko must now go to live with her grandmother, whoruns a traditional Japanese inn nearby. There she meets the spirit of a young boy, and together with others she meets along the way she works to learn all she can about caring for guests and resultantly bringing herself personal happiness in this beautiful depiction of healing, death, and rebirth. I very much enjoyed the story, and couldn't find any flaws with it. The animation overall looked very good, with a few minor flaws such as too much of a sheen being added to Okko's hair at points, as well as one or two shots with a momentarily choppy framerate. The colors are nice and vibrant, and do a very good job immersing you along with the well placed soundtrack, which was well composed. All of the mostly non-secondary characters have a lot of personality to them, and(excuse the irony here) are three dimensional, every one of them feels like real people. Despite being rated G, Okko's Inn deals with heavy topics such as PTSD and moving on after loss, and it does so extremely well, while keeping the tone mostly light. As someone who can be pretty empathetic when watching films, I cried when watching this. You may not cry(or even tear up, you monster), but I can guarantee that throughout most of the film, you'll have a big smile on your face. I know I did. Story: 10 Art: 9 Sound: 8 Character: 10 Enjoyment: 10 Overall: 9.4/10 I highly recommend this film(my sister enjoyed it a lot as well, in case you were wondering).

The_Ruise★ 8

I watched and enjoyed the television series before watching the movie, which may or may not be rare. When I walked into the theatre, I was actually the only person there AND I was 5 or 6 minutes late, both of which are a real shame, until a small group of people walked in at least 25 minutes late. Anyway, the first half of the film was amazing, leaps and bounds over the television series which, in my opinion, was already good. I did enjoy how far the film went into Okko's depression and even serious PTSD over her parents' death, which the series kindof brushes over. Okko even has dreams/visions of her parents still being alive and with her, when we never got to see them in the TV show, as far as I remember. I LOVED the focus on Glory and how she was such a good adult gal pal to Okko, and she makes a terrific older sister character. I also loved that there was no shoehorned romantic subplot, all the ghost hijinks, and the voice acting/dialogue for the English dub was very well done (Matsuki's famous quotes were neat, the jokes and jabs were good, and Suzuki's voice was amazingly funny). Over all, I thought everything was very well executed. The thing that ultimately kept me from enjoying this movie more was a certain twist that happens with Uribou and Mio. They don't get much focus in the second half despite starting off as great supporting characters and friends for Okko, and there's really no time for any of the three supernatural characters to get full character arcs. I love them already from watching the TV series and I love all the screentime they did get, but I don't know if a movie-only viewer would get as much from them. And the climax was something predictable that often happens to ghosts in movies, which I was really, really grateful never happened in the TV series and really hope it never does in that canon, but it did here, so the ending was a real bummer for me. I would like to watch it again...if my emotions ever recover, which seems unlikely. TLDR If you liked the movie, you should definitely give the show a try. It's not as flashy, but it's happier and should cheer you up if you were depressed by the movie's ending. Also more Matsuki.