#AGhibliADay #OceanWaves

Today, we watched Ocean Waves, a movie neither of us had seen before. It's a story about Taku, now in college, reminiscing about Rikako, a girl he crushed on during high school, as he goes back to his hometown for a reunion.

And man, we hated it.

Rikako is a mid-year transplant from Tokyo, and she quickly gains the attention of most of the boys, but especially Yutaka, Taku's friend. Yutaka is instantly smitten, but can't work up the courage to confess his feelings. Rikako, meanwhile, manages to be rude, annoying, and outright mean to almost everyone at her new school. She lies to Yutaka and Taku both to get some money from them, and then lies to her only friend, Yumi, in an attempt to go back to Tokyo to see her father, whom she blames her mother for divorcing. Taku ends up going with her instead of Yumi because Yumi really didn't want to lie to her parents. On the trip, Rikako treats Taku quite badly.

And he still somehow ends up falling for her because I guess boys are idiots.

We are supposed to feel sorry for Rikako. Her parents have divorced, and she's been forced to move out to the country after living in Tokyo her whole life. But it's very hard not to intensely dislike her because she has almost zero redeeming qualities. She's a liar, a manipulator, she lashes out at people who try to help her, she's mean and nasty, and she slaps Taku twice for absolutely no reason beyond the fact that she's angry at what he's saying (even though the second time he was trying to be nice).

I try very hard not to give up on movies. If I don't like something in the first 15 minutes or so, chances are pretty good I'm gonna not like it by the end, but even so, I give them a chance, I give them the benefit of the doubt. People spend a lot of time and effort to make art, and the least I can do is experience it in full, and then decide if I like it or not. While I did finish Ocean Waves, it also reminded me strongly of one of the few films I quit after the first 5 minutes: My Sassy Girl. Both of these stories are about mostly nice, and mostly stupid boys who fall for girls who are just absolutely awful to them. The boys do all these things for the girls, and the girls just walk all over them. Taku stands up for himself more than the protagonist of My Sassy Girl does (again, I quit after five minutes, but my friends continued watching it in my room and I've had reports 😛 ), but it's still an absolute chore to watch this ridiculous premise.

Towards the end of the film, Taku reminisces about various interactions he's had with Rikako in what's supposed to be a schmaltzy "oh look at all these great memories we have together" montage, but, I kid you not, all of these memories are of Rikako being a jerk and using Taku for various things. None of them are romantic or sappy in the least.

Maybe there was something lost in translation. Maybe, like Tales from Earthsea yesterday, something was lost in the adaptation (Ocean Waves was also adapted from a novel). But man, something was lost for damn sure.

We're watching Nausicaä tomorrow because we'll at least be certain we're getting a good movie this time 😛