Anime On the Big Screen: “I Want to Eat Your Pancreas”

Venue: Dendy Cinemas, Level 2, North Quarter, Canberra Centre, 148 Bunda Street, Canberra City, ACT
Date: Saturday 20 October 2018
Distributor: Madman Entertainment
Format: Digital Projection, Japanese dialogue with English subtitles
Length: 108 minutes
Production Date: 2018
Currently on Home Video in English (as of writing): No

In the space of a few weeks there are three anime films in local cinemas, with two on this weekend. Spring has arrived and while it’s rather warm it's also a bit stormy. Instead of rain all day there were several short torrential downpours accompanied by lightning. Not the best weather to go out in. And despite the weather as per usual the Canberra Centre was packed. There was a desk full of promotional material for the Japanese Film Festival near the top of the escalators in the cinema which was currently under way. I’ll be going to see one film from that tomorrow. It was a pretty low turnout for this late afternoon session of the film; seven people, a Malaysian family of three who really seemed to enjoy the film, a couple in their early twenties, myself and one other bloke. With these regularly low turnouts I sort of wonder what the future holds for theatrical anime… Anyway, let’s talk about the film;

In a town in Toyama Prefecture, an unassuming, quiet 17 year old teen boy routinely goes about reading books, all the time ignoring his classmates. After having an appendectomy, he returns to the hospital a few weeks later to have the stitches removed. Sitting in the waiting area of the hospital, he notices a book on the seats in the next aisle. He tentatively looks around for its owner and finding no one decides to read the cover; “Living with Dying”, written in pen. Inside he is slightly startled to see it’s the diary of a girl in his class, Sakura Yamauchi, which chronicles her life with a pancreatic disease which she knows will soon end her life. Suddenly she appears in front of him asking for the diary back. Sakura realises he has probably read at least some of the pages, so she confirms to him that she is dying. He rather aloofly tells her that he doesn’t really care for other people and as it is his turn to be served, walks to the counter. Sakura is rather intrigued by his response as it is most definitely not the usual response she hears from people when she tells them she is dying.

Much to his annoyance, Sakura pesters him to hang out together. Initially she helps him at the school library (being a loner and a total bookworm, this totally suits him), where he puts returned books back on the shelf. The chatty, happy go lucky Sakura tells him that she has told no one of her pancreatic disease outside her family. One day she tells him that she heard that in other cultures people eat parts of organs to cure their own sick organs and jokingly suggests she wants to eat his pancreas to get better. Sakura later manages to drag him around town where she saves an old lady from being shaken down for compensation money by a gang. He questions if she has no fear due to her limited time, however Sakura denies this. Classmates see both of them out together and they become the talk of the class. No one can figure why Sakura wants to hang out with the most antisocial guy in class.

The pair are go to an all you can eat sweets restaurant where Sakura’s best friend, Kyoko, spots them and publicly questions Sakura why she is dating him. Kyoko is incredibly protective of her friend and is unashamedly hostile towards him. Sakura accosts him at school and warns him not to hurt Sakura. Later Sakura shows the boy her bucket list and despite his reluctance to be with her they cross off a number of activities she has always wanted to do. She tells him that she needs him to be her friend until the end. During the summer holidays Sakura asks him out for a short day trip, which ends up being a two day overnight journey to Fukuoka. They see the sites of Kuyshu, but when they return to hotel Sakura realises she has made a booking error and has booked only one room. She gets beer and snacks from the local convenience store, which shocks the rather conservative boy as both of them are not of drinking age.

Despite that the two of them end up playing truth or dare, in which the boy discovers more about Sakura. He also accidentally finds her pills, insulin and syringes which keep her alive, which affects him greatly. The night ends with her being too drunk to get up, so she forces him to carry her to the bed and also to sleep next to her. Sometime later Sakura coerces him to visit her house. She becomes a little too playful and hugs him, suggesting that they both have sex. However she backs off saying it was a joke. Rather frustrated, he picks her up and pins her to the bed. Realising he has done the wrong thing as Sakura cries, he leaves disgusted with himself. Outside he runs into the class representative, Takahiro, whom he doesn’t realise is her old boyfriend she has recently broke up with, and accidentally ends up insulting him. Takahiro punches him and Sakura runs outside to stop Takahiro from hurting him further. Thinking he could win her back, Takahiro is baffled by her response. The boy now realises that he needs to be beside her until the end.

This is the third adaptation of Yoru Sumino’s light novel which was originally published in 2015. It has spawned a live action film, released last year, and a manga adaptation. Both the novel and the manga will be published in English by Seven Seas Entertainment next month and in early 2019 respectively. This anime adaption was produced by Studio VOLN, a relatively new studio whose only claims to fame are a co-production of the recent “Ushio and Tora” TV series and “Idol Incidents”. They also produced a new anime film for the “Garo” franchise called “Usuzumizakura -Garo-“, which came out in Japan earlier this month. The director and screenwriter, Shinichiro Ushijima, is also a relatively unknown quantity. His previous directing credits include several episodes of the TV series' “Death Parade”, the newer “Hunter x Hunter” series and “One Punch Man”. I do find it quite interesting that a lot of new anime films coming to cinemas are helmed by pretty much complete unknowns. Producer Aniplex seems to have faith in him and the studio though. The film made its Australian debut a bit over two weeks after the Japanese theatrical release at the Madman Anime Festival in Melbourne, and is in cinemas just a bit over six weeks after the Japanese release.

From what I’ve seen in a lot of the reviews so far the film has polarised many people. Because of that my expectations were relatively low going in. I was happily surprised that the film easily exceeded those expectations. First of all the promotional material and the story synopsis lead you to believe this going to be a really overly sentimental, mawkish tear jerker of a film. Secondly, it does seem rather obvious where the film will end up. Perhaps I have become rather sentimental in my old age, but I didn’t feel my emotions were blatantly manipulated like they were in “Maquia”. In part I think this is due to the writing and fact Sakura is not portrayed as some weak, sickly girl we forced to feel for. Instead she’s presented as an incredibly cheerful and outgoing young woman. Her illness is barely touched upon and we never see any obvious decline in her health or her looking fragile. When the end comes, it's like a bolt out of the blue. There is no gradual decline as you might expect. I am rather glad for this as I thought I was going to be put through an emotional wringer.

I’ve seen some reviews completely miss the point of the unnamed lead male character (who is finally named in the last reel of the film). It’s not about wish fulfilment for young men. I certainly don’t view it as being a fantasy about dull men getting the good looking girl. It’s clearly about having empathy for others, about bringing joy into other people’s life. Sakura trusts the boy because of his initial reaction to her illness. He won’t treat her as some fragile object. In return she brings him out of his shell. I honestly don’t understand why some people can’t see this or why they have a problem with it. The other thing I took from the film is how awful the pecking order is at Japanese schools. Apart from one exception, the teen named “Gum Boy” in the credits, everyone in the class seems to ostracise the unnamed protagonist when he gets close to Sakura. It’s pretty awful and its little wonder the boy doesn’t want to get close to others.

While the first two thirds of the film concentrate on the relationship between Sakura and the boy, the last third does become somewhat schmaltzy with a number of “cute” shots of the elderly and children built around a hospital scene and after Sakura’s death (you know it was coming) and a rather odd pastel coloured dream-like sequence built around the boy reading her diary. There are also three Japanese pop songs (the opening, insert song and end credits) from various pop rock bands which don’t help the story at all. All three sound the same and are rather dull, like a lot of commercial pop rock songs from major Japanese labels. The title, although explained fairly early on in the film, is rather odd, especially to those not familiar with its origins from certain Asian cultures. Considering the bemused responses to the film's title I've seen online, I’m surprised it wasn’t retooled for English speaking audiences, especially since neither the light novel nor manga had been commercially released in English yet.

Despite the fact this film has received some quite negative reviews, I really enjoyed it. It has been quite a long time since a theatrical anime film has actually surprised me. The street cars and the depiction of the town in Toyama Prefecture look fantastic, as does a sequence involving the tragic young couple watching fireworks. The last two reels of the film do veer on becoming quite maudlin, but manage not to teeter over the edge. The film really is a bit of tear jerker, however I felt a lot of this emotion was rather genuine. There’s no blatantly obvious manipulation of emotions like you see in other recent films (“Maquia” being particularly bad in this area). It seems the director has adapted the material fairly faithfully. I have read that people (including the novelist himself) prefer the novel or live action adaption, however I am coming in fresh to this film and have not experienced either. I quite liked this adaptation and am looking forward to whatever director Shinichiro Ushijima does next. Oh, and by the way, stay until the after the end credits. My mantra for modern anime films is wait until you see the Eirin mark and copyright details before walking out of the cinema! 7 out of 10.