Ride Your Wave is a Japanese animated film created by Masaaki Yuasa who is mostly know for his out of the box films such as The Night Is Long, Walk On Girl. The film opened to over three hundred theaters last year and made it to the top ten films of the week as number nine. Many people have also praised the film for it's realism in relationships even if the film was more normal than Yuasa's other works.
A girl moves to a beach side town where she knows none. Her love for surfing and the sea keeps her optimistic though. She then meets a guy after dangerous circumstances. They looked to be together forever until he loses his life in a accident. One day the girl notices that her boyfriend appears in water every time she sings their favorite song. ......
The first half of Ride Your Wave is a bunch of story building. Building up on the location, characters, and their relationships. Love gets laid on real thick in a good portion of the introduction but you have to understand that this is to create a connection with the characters. On top of this, all the characters are very likable due to their relatable personalities however, the action doesn't start till midway through the film. As the fantasy element arises, viewers are forced to face a growing feeling of dread as you watch a miracle be realized to be an impossible situation. Ride Your Waves has a couple of funny light moments to keep you afloat while still presenting cold hard reality. It's a reality that nether viewers nor the main character want to face but life was never meant to be a smooth sailing ride. I enjoyed the core message: "taking life by the horns" or in this case, riding the waves life brings your way. Nothing it every easy when you lose a loved one that you thought you could lean on for eternity. When the time comes for you to stand back up again, you must choose to move on or stay in the same spot. You have to get a move on if you want to keep living. End of story. This is a hard pill to swallow for us humans in life and Ride Your Waves presents this real to life conflict beautifully all the way to the ending credit roll. I actually quite enjoyed the message of the film more than the fantasy aspect due to this fact.
The animation in character model looks purely as something Yuasa would draw. I thought the appearance of the legs, eyes, and body were different yet still fit in the casual Japanese anime style. Much of the CGI was used for the ocean scenes and for some of the buildings which looked very pleasing to the eyes. The surfing scenes overall were fun to watch because of the soundtrack's energy. J-pop boyband Generations From Exile Tribe got a whole promotional ad thanks to this film. Well, that song and Omelet rice...[INSERT ME LAUGHING] Their song, Brand New Story was the sole theme song. The English dub lyrics are so cute too. Speaking of the english dub..... They all did the film justice as a guy who prefers overdub when watching anime(and Japanese when watching live action..). Also, shout out to the English cast for recording the whole film from their respective homes during Covid-19. I see all the hard work to bring this film to English speaking audiences. If I had to find anything I didn't like about Ride Your wave, it would have to be the drawn out sequences with only the soundtrack. You know those scenes used to show time is passing. Makoto Shinkai is guilty of doing this also. Sometimes it works, then other times you might be bored to tears.
Ride Your Wave's strong life message and likable characters are enough to keep the film sturdy on any surfboard. There's a bit of falling involved but I can promise that you will find a safe landing before the film is over.
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