Spoiler free review

" A distance that takes 8 years at the speed of light is no different than saying 'forever' " Hoshi no Koe is a 25 minute movie/ova by [Makoto Shinkai ](https://anilist.co/staff/96117/Makoto-Shinkai) and [Comix wave ](https://anilist.co/studio/291/CoMix-Wave). The scarcity in budget can be traced not only from bad animations or character designs but also from the fact that except for music almost most of the staff work script,character design, animations, direction and production was done by Shinkai himself and the production team, even the VAs were very limited. But that doesn't stop it's heartfelt and very "*realistic*" story from touching viewer's emotions. __Story__- 9.5/10 Hoshi no koe is set in future where space exploration is booming. People from all over the world are recruited for space expeditions and to fight against other alien like creatures from whom all these technologies are derived which led the human space technology in the state it is now. The story focuses on 2 junior high school students Noboru and Mikako who, as many others, fall in love with each other. But then after graduation Mikako is selected as to join the space expedition to Mars and if situation arises, to fend off aliens inhabiting the place. The story however isn't focused on these fights, explorations and aliens. It's complete focus is on the relationship of these two. Before Mikako leaves earth they decide to be in touch via mails and continue their long distance relationship. But as you might know, nothing can travel faster than speed of light and sadly, not even human emotions. As the distance between them grows, literally but not emotionally, they're faced with cruel reality as the only link connecting them glows dimmer. Earlier I used the word *realistic* because the concept is derived from something really plausible which makes the emotions even more spontaneous. __Characters__- 8.5/10 There are just 2 characters. I mean not just 2 main characters but 2 characters overall in whole 25 minutes of the movie. But instead of having it exploited as it's weakness, Hoshi no koe uses it in it's advantage by giving great character development to these two. Both Mikako and Noboro go through a lot of changes through the years, but Noboru's character development is especially perceivable, he tries to suppress his emotions and hides his helplessness by pretending to an adult and trying to blend in the society but deep inside he knows himself that nothing can fill that empty void inside of him. Mikako too, as she goes to the places no human has ever went before, sees new places, sceneries so beautiful that can't be described in words but none of it seems to put her heart at ease as the simple rain in July after the school on earth with Noboru did. __Animations__ - 4/10 Here I wish that it had good animations. This is only part that lets it down. Character designs also are not good. Only good thing in animations are the sceneries( the one on earth specially). It uses Cgi for most of the space scenes in motion and that cgi is bad (still not as bad as berserk 2016). __Music__ - 8/10 There isn't much music, but where it is, it's executed perfectly. The inserted song at the ending melts perfectly with the ending and left me frozen momentarily. __Overall__- 8/10 Even though it's quite short, 25 minutes, being the length of a single episode of an anime, it still manages to be better and convey much more emotions than many of the full length animes of this category. I highly recommend it. If you like the likes of Kimi no na wa then you'll probably love this too. Give it as try you won't regret it.

Voices of a Distant Star is, in a word, ambitious. Makoto Shinkai wrote, directed, and produced the anime in a period of seven months using his Power Mac G4. If that alone wasn’t impressive, he provided half of the voices for the original Japanese audio. The 2002 OVA’s story was ambitious as well: telling a story that spans nearly a decade about two childhood friends who are dragged further and further apart. It’s a story that mixes fantastical mecha elements with a very relatable, slice-of-life romance. The story sounds like it could make for a decent one-cour show, at the shortest. Prepare to pick up your jaw from the floor because Voices of a Distant Star is only twenty-five minutes long. Ambitious indeed.

And, believe it or not, Makoto Shinkai manages to pull off a compelling story despite the short run time. Nagamine Mikako and Terao Noboru are junior high school students and best friends. They are anticipating attending the same high school, but Mikako is soon recruited to serve as a pilot for UN Spacey. She’s deployed and the two are forced to communicate via text messages. As she’s deployed farther and farther from Earth, Noboru must wait longer and longer to receives texts from his friend (I loved this astronomical detail). I was initially worried that the story would end up being either quite dense and confusing or sparse and unfulfilling, but a lot happens in a short time, yet it doesn’t feel like too much. A careful balance is struck; enough is shown to make the story to make it cohesive while, given the runtime, the OVA isn’t bogged down. In hearing their thoughts about the situation they’re in, even if they’re not super fleshed out, you really start to feel for them. Helping out matters is the music which is simple, but moving.

The low point of this anime is definitely the animation and art. Given that this was a solo project, I suppose it couldn’t be helped. Character models often look downright amateurish and at times remind me of something from ctrl-alt-del. Luckily, the art didn’t detract from the experience much, for me, but if subpar art bothers you, I’d take heed. There’s also CGI for the mechs, but it really didn’t seem that out of place. For its faults, the anime still looks pretty modern for 2002.

I didn’t really like how the story started in media res, with Makoto in a school building, only for it to be revealed to be her internal musings, with her in a mech. Yes, it’s shocking, but it’s also confusing and I think it would be better if the story was told chronologically, given how short it is and how necessary it is for the viewer to understand this story. Still, this is a minor nitpick.

Ultimately, there isn’t much to say about Voices of a Distant Star, but that’s more due to its brevity than anything. The things that are said are pretty much all positive. I enjoyed my brief time with this OVA and implore viewers to experience this hidden gem for themselves. It’s only twenty-five minutes, but it certainly leaves an impression for longer.

8/10

B-

Here be spoilers.

"When I leave I don't know what I'm hoping to find\When I leave I don't know what I'm leaving behind" \-_The Analog Kid_, Rush

How much do you care about the things you care about? How much effort would you put in to them, to get them done or finished, if you really, really had to? How willing are you to go that extra mile, or two, or five? And what kind of self-belief does it take to believe that people will like it when you finish?

With those in mind, it's a damned miracle that any film gets released at all, really. But directors wouldn't be directors if they didn't have a vision. In this short, you can feel the vision of its director straining at the surface to break out. In places, it nearly does. But in most of it, it's hidden by the failings in other areas. What's clear, though, is that this short by Makoto Shinkai has the ideas and the pedigree to be great. But it never stretches beyond being just good.

But maybe that's OK.

"Time is...such a cruel thief." - Story

Shinkai's standard fare of connections and the things that break them is fertile ground for storytelling. This variation on it is particularly clever, because it occupies a world which is, in 2020, retro-futuristic. Whilst the Japanese did use flip phones for a lot longer than we did in the West, the main plot device of flip phones being the only anchor that holds a relationship that hasn't yet had the chance to even come into existence together is a clever one.

Because it's not really about the technology. What it's about is the fact that sometimes there are barriers between us which stop us from saying what we'd like. And that's a properly heartbreaking thing, which Shinkai does his best to capture the absolute quintessence of - and mostly succeeds.

So the story, such as it is, doesn't matter so much. It's about high school lovers, separated by space and eventually by time, linked together by the tiny thread of their messages to the ether. It's a clever if maybe not technically scientific conceit (and certainly one likely at least inspired by Gunbuster), and as the two spiral further and further apart in both space and time Shinkai leverages his setting to provide a set of heart-rending little moments. More on this in a second.

As the movie ends, a nice little insert song by Ai Miyoko starts playing, and Shinkai unveils the very cleverest feat: a typical mecha action scene but devoid of the standard exciting cutting - instead, with big and sweeping camera movements and a voiceover on top from Sumi Mutoh that tones down the volume of the scene. Shinkai, I think, knows that he can't hope to match the production values of a big-budget mecha series, and therefore tries (and succeeds) at something quite different.

"A distance that takes eight years at the speed of light, is no different than saying, 'forever.'" - Art, Backgrounds, and Direction

The good: Makoto Shinkai's strength has always been his art and backgrounds, and he's a very clear eye for a very specific sort of background - not just sky porn, but specifically the sort of imagery designed to be reminiscent of something. Sometimes that's the sky, since everyone's seen it and imagined the sky. But Shinkai's very best backgrounds are the ones that aren't photoreal, as he slides into magical realism. Almost every shot you will see from 5cm per second, say, looks too good to be true. Shinkai's utilisation of animation to give a magical and nostalgic edge to highly realist tracings of real places is tops, and his instinct for and interest in celestial lighting is impressively good.

The bad: Makoto Shinkai is much worse at depicting high technology, a failing that he repeated in The Place Promised..., and which holds him up here badly. Minimal shots of the mechas and the artificial lighting minimise the issue, but when they're used they're really not very good.

The ugly: The character designs. Admittedly, there are only two characters on screen at all, but...they look awful, they go off model a lot, and action animation is bizarrely herky-jerky. Unfortunately...that means that there's a definite slide-showy feel to the movie - understandable for the work of one man, but still an issue.

So...what's the result? Well, Shinkai knows that he's not personally skilled enough to sell character animation convincingly. So it leads to a utilisation of the imagery-barrage style under a voiceover which has since become nearly a trademark. Shinkai is interested in images, and he's very good at picking extremely evocative ones.

"...together?" - Music and Sound

Tenmon's piano score is elegiac and moving, whilst the ED song is well-done, if not as spectacular as the songs of Your Name or 5 Centimeters Per Second (or even Children Who Chase Lost Voices). Sound design, especially in the mecha scenes, is genuinely quite good, although the mixing can be suspect at times. I'm guessing this is mostly intentional, but for the most part it's relatively unimportant.

"I wonder if...you'll forget about me?" - Final Thoughts

This is a really rough draft. And make no mistake, there are lots and lots of rough edges in this short. But there's something undeniably magnetic about Makoto Shinkai's directing, art, and ideas. If there weren't, then they wouldn't make up for the rough edges. And that, I think, is all that you can ask from a short like this one. Potential, some polish, and promise.

It's less than half an hour. Why not give it a spin?

"I am here."

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- Pointy