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Whisper of the Heart (Blu-ray) – Review

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Whisper of the Heart (Blu-ray) - Review 1Title: Whisper of the Heart (Blu-ray)
Published by: Madman Entertainment (Australia / New Zealand)
Based on: Whisper of the Heart (Manga/Novel) by Aoi Hiiragi
Genre: Drama, Romance
Audio: English and Japanese Dubs
Subtitles: English
Aspect Ratio: 1080p High Definition
Runtime: 111 minutes
Cost: $39.95
Classification: This title has been classified as PG for Mild Themes
Special Thanks: Special thanks goes to the Madman Entertainment PR Team for providing me with a review sample of this title.

After a few months, Madman Entertainment have finally gone ahead and distributed this Studio Ghibli title as an enhanced Blu-ray edition, following releasing My Neighbors the Yamadas, Laputa: Castle in the Sky and Nausicaa of the Valley of the Wind earlier on in the year. The series introduced the character Baron Humbert von Gikkingen who later featured in the series “The Cat Returns” which to this date is my favourite Ghibli release…. so I had high expectations of this film. As the first ever Studio Ghibli release not directed by Hayao Miyazaki but instead by Yoshifumi Kondo, it had a lot riding on it… but how does this release fare 15 years after its Japanese release? and does the Blu-ray version offer the quality you may expect? Find out in my review of Whisper of the Heart!

Whisper of the Heart (Blu-ray) - Review 2

Shizuku Tsukishima is a bit of a book worm, spending her last summer vaction in junior high school reading and translating popular foreign music into Japanese. With aspirations to one day become a writer, Shizuku can’t help but notice that the name Seiji Amasawa appears on every one of the books she borrows from the library.

Through a series of curious and magical incidents, she comes to meet Seiji and discovers he has dreams of becoming a famous violin maker in Italy. While their life-long goals pull them in two different diections, Shizuku and Seiji are determined to remain true to their strong feelings for one another.

As with most Studio Ghibli titles, this is more of a light hearted series with no action or anything too extreme but instead is your classic romance story where one girl through a number of different incidents comes across someone who shares her passion of reading, while at the same time having goals that threaten to have her crush and their friendship cut short. The slow starts off very slowly, taking time to introduce the character of Shizuku, her relationship with her family and friends, as well as her love of books – having noticed during her attempts at reading 20 books over her vacation that someone by the name of Seiji Amasawa is listed above her on every borrowing card (Ah… the good ol’ days where library checkout cards were in use). One day while delivering lunch to her father who worked at the local library, she follows a cat and arrives at an antique shop where she gets inspired by a number of items in the shop including Baron Humbert von Jikkingen and a restored Grandfather Clock which inspires her with inspiration…. and little does she know that this encounter will bring her to meet this mysterious Amasawa and an idea of what she wants to do in the future.

Whisper of the Heart (Blu-ray) - Review 3

As I said, for the first part of the story, it is fairly slow and also attempts to deviate into a number of subplots that go nowhere including a complicated love…. whatever between her best friend and another friend and little things such as that which given the limited time frame, took up minutes that could have been used effectively. It is a bittersweet relationship between the two protagonists and while they evidently didn’t have enough time to let it blossom, the result of their formal meeting left a strong impression on Shizuku as she realizes what she should attempt to do with her life. It was a mostly well thought out and presented coming of age story which focused on life decisions and feelings shared between others of common interests.

While it is only a small element of the second part of the series, the character Baron Humbert von Jikkingen appears in a fantasy scene of a novel being written by Shizuku. Both the Baron, and another cat known as Moota (Who appears as a stray cat in Whisper of the Heart) feature in a feature film of their own titled The Cat Returns, due to the popularity of their role in this film. The sad thing was they made his plot very interesting, but they only touch upon it once or twice for a brief moment – making me appreciate The Cat Returns slightly less and want another Ghibli film based on that. Overall however, there was room for improvement but I thoroughly enjoyed watching the bittersweet series that provided some interesting character development and a perfect coming-of-age tale!

Whisper of the Heart (Blu-ray) - Review 4

There is a thing about this review I would like for you to review. As this is a Blu-ray version of the series I currently am unable to do screenshots through my media players… so I have temporarily had to use the stock ones provided by Madman Entertainement and all but perhaps the second one do not represent the quality of the film in Blu-ray in terms of colour toning. Keeping in mind that the anime was originally released in the middle of 1995, the design is still of a very good quality with picturesque landscapes that are incredibly detailed and a surprisingly strong attention to detail in character designs. Despite the anime style, I could not help but notice the designs also held a realistic charm to them. Not the best work by Studio Ghibli in terms of design, but still is of the Ghibli standard and put across the style they were after well.

For those who particularly dislike the song “Take Me Home, Country Road”, you may find this series a bit awkward as they do include the song numerous times, performed by many people and with many different sets of lyrics – up to the point where they remove the tension from the film by having Shizuku sing along to the song with Seiji on the violin and other performers entering mid-way through the song. While I loved the incorporation of the song, I must admit I felt awkward listening to the Olivia Newton-John version of the song at the start of the film and getting that feeling that they may have altered the song playlist slightly to Americanize it. The other music in the show is your normal assortment of Ghibli-style songs with some very enjoyable softer tracks. Voice acting I felt was much more enjoyable and realistic in English than in the original Japanese dub, with strong performances from Brittany Snow and David Gallagher and Shizuku and Seiji respectively. The difference was very clear in the aforementioned Country Road violin scene, where while Brittany Snow managed to keep the childlike tone of Shizuku’s voice, the Japanese dub had her sounding a bit older than her actual character voice which made it sound a bit awkward. Either way the dubbing was fine however.

Whisper of the Heart (Blu-ray) - Review 5

The disc also contains a nice set of bonus extras which should be good enough for fans and collectors alike. When watching the film, you can toggle on and off storyboards which appear all through the movie to the bottom right hand side of the screen (These can also be toggled through a menu option) and is a nice inclusion. For those who enjoyed the Baron fictional sequences, they have also included a four and a bit minute video on the environment designs of these scenes in particular, and are incredibly detailed. They include an incredibly long (and boring) segment titled 4 Masterpieces of Naohisa Inoue: From Start to Finish which I couldn’t sit through for more thant 30 seconds. More relevant to the series itself is the usual Behind the Microphone: detailing the thoughts of the voice talent in the series, TV Spots and Theatrical Trailers and finally the Ghibli Trailers for “The Art of Studio Ghibli”, Laputa: Castle in the Sky, Ponyo, Nausicaa of the Valley of the Wind, Spirited Away and My Neighbours the Yamadas.

Personally, while I would not call this my favourite Studio Ghibli title by any means, I would perhaps call it my favourite early Ghibli title which is a bit more… light hearted than other releases around that time period. It is without a doubt another masterpiece from this studio that every anime fan should consider adding to their collection.

Final Score
Storyline / Character Development: A-
Design: 
A-
Music/Voice Acting: A
Packaging/Extras: 
A
Personal Preference: 
A
Overall Score: A
Sam
Sam
Founder of The Otaku's Study. I have been exploring this labyrinth of fandom these last fifteen years, and still nowhere close to the exit yet. Probably searching for a long time to come.

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