Whisper of the Heart (1995)

Whisper of the Heart (1995)

Dir. Yoshifumi Kondō

Based on a manga of the same name (by Aoi Hiiragi), WotH is a wonderful coming of age drama set in a typical suburb of Tokyo.

Its primary character is fourteen-year-old Shizuku Tsukishima, a junior high school student who loves books. Shizuku is a voracious reader who makes regular trips to the school library. She notices one day that many of the books she's borrowed that year were checked-out also by one other person.

For the benefit of anyone born after the turn of the millennium, it's important to note the era because before everything everywhere existed in a computer database, checkout cards were a real thing in library books. It isn't something the writers made up, and it wasn't exclusive to Japan. It's a true reflection of what folks my age might call a 'simpler time', before smartphones and social media, etc, and all the negativity that now exists as a result.

Okay, too much digression. Shizuku begins to wonder what the other person named on the checkout cards is like. If the two of them share interests in literature and genre, what else might they have in common? And so begins a heartfelt journey into previously unexplored feelings.

In addition to handling themes of growth and change, it's a poignant study of how one's world view can change from day to day, being affected by the places we find ourselves travelling to and the relationships that we form with others. Wisdom tells us that having one's eyes opened to new things doesn't always just mean seeing more, it can mean feeling more, too - and that, in turn, can help one to recognise the point at which life-changing stories begin.

NOTE: it has playful nods to a few other Studio Ghibli films, such as Laputa, Porco, and Kiki, but it's biggest connection is to The Cat Returns (2002), which is a kind of spin-off feature.